The Devil You Know
by circleofstars
Summary: In a town where madness walks the streets like the plague, an old enemy catches up with the Winchesters. Sam still hasn't come to terms with what happened last time, and he's not ready to nearly lose his brother again... Sequel to 'Unseen, unheard'
1. A light igniting

_This is a sequel to **Unseen, unheard**. It would probably be better to read that first, but you are welcome to read whatever you like, in whatever order you prefer! The villain of **Unseen, unheard**, Michael Andover, was much hated by everyone, so I thought I'd bring him back. :D Warnings for… well, violence, gore, and probably some swearing. And for slow updates, because I'm very busy at the moment – sorry. _

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A window flapped, displaced by quiet winds. The town was shrouded in thick, tepid air, choked by woods, clinging like parasites to the edges of the settlement. It was a summer night, warm and humid, so much so that even outside, the air didn't taste fresh. Between stray dogs' pads, the damp earth seemed to putrefy. It was a town in decay.

Residents rolled awkwardly in their sleep, sweating into sticky blankets, which twisted and constricted around their feet. A howl wracked the silence, but it was a half-hearted one, muted quickly, caught in the heavy air.

Watching a strip of yellow moonlight crawl along the floor of his impersonal bedroom, Michael Andover lay awake. He hadn't slept in weeks – it could have been months. He rolled over and stared absently at the obscure shapes on the ceiling, watching shadows move, without seeing them.

He was thinking about weeks of police questioning, cells, bail, more questions.

He was thinking about everything he had lost – the shallow half-trust of his classmates, the empty half-love of his guardian.

He was thinking about the opportunity for a purpose and a family, ripped from him when he'd had it so close that he could feel a new life tingling at his fingertips.

He was thinking about his psychic abilities, feeble and vague since the disaster, like he had been cut off from his source of power. For a short time, he had been a god; now, he was fumbling in the dark for a candle-flicker of energy. He was nothing, now, just a sad child, alone in the world.

Floating in such dismal thoughts, it was surprising that Michael was buzzing with a sort of cold elation. He had read about strange happenings in a town two counties away, and then – faint and hazy, mirage like – he had seen it. An image, flickering in front of him. He knew where the Winchesters were.

And he had a purpose now.

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Paul Hartshorne felt his body wracked by an involuntary shudder, though the night was warm. He swallowed, so hard his throat felt bruised with the effort, and steeled himself. There really was no need to be _this_ nervous. Carelessly, he brought his car to a graceless, shuddering halt, some distance from the curb. His damp fingers checked once more that the painstakingly wrapped little packet was resting safe in his inner pocket. He took great care not to crush it as he stood and stumbled over the neat lawn to the white door. Bathed in the warm golden glow falling from the windows, he felt jittery, exposed, a rabbit in headlights. He checked his reflection one final time in the dark glass of the door. He looked somewhat better than he felt. He shuddered again as he knocked.

When she opened the door, he jerked clumsily, startled. She grinned at him, shyly amused by his antics. He managed a sickly smile, inwardly cursing her. She looked so delicate, like a flower in the morning, young and unblemished and beautiful. It made this so much harder – his throat constricted, and his eyes burned with the effort of not choking.

Maybe she took his awkwardness for disinterest, maybe for passion, but she seemed embarrassed by it. She bowed her head slightly, and regarded him uncertainly through her eyelashes.

'I'm ready, then,' she said. 'Shall we go?'

He smiled, and answered hoarsely. 'Yeah, sure,' he croaked. He swallowed again, then pressed on. 'I bought something for you…' he said. There, he'd said it. Now, he had to go through with it.

'Oh!' she said. Her lips almost made a perfect circle when she did that, he noticed. Her eyes lit from the inside with genuine surprise and pleasure. 'Paul, honestly, you don't have to do that… you'll spoil me!' she added, laughing gently. She was breathless, too.

He tried to grin. In the half-light filtering through the window-blinds, it might have looked like a smile. He reached into his jacket and closed his fingers around the packet, careful not to brush aside the paper or to touch the precious gift enclosed within. He held it out to her. The weight of it leaving his fingers was like a release, he had to prevent himself letting out a sigh of relief. She had taken it. It wasn't in his hands any more.

The words rushed out of him, like a dam had broken. In a way, it had. 'This is an antique – it's not new, it was my mother's, but she told me I should give it to a girl… when I found someone that I – well, you know…'

She paused in her careful unwrapping and looked up at him, smiling tenuously, bright tears shining in her eyes. 'Thank you, Paul…' she said. Her gentle voice rang with gratitude, but he brushed it aside in his impatience.

'Open it…' he urged her. 'Put it on…'

She smiled at him, and pulled aside the last of the paper to reveal the pendant, lying in the twists of its gold chain. She held it up, offering it to him so that he could work the catch behind her neck, but he pretended not to notice the gesture, half-turning away from her, then anxiously looking back. She fixed it herself. The pendant swung wildly, and came to rest in the centre of her pale chest.

It was made from some dark metal, and it formed a hollow circle, containing a graceful teardrop shape, bisected by a horizontal line. Paul stood transfixed by it for a few seconds.

'It's beautiful,' she smiled, a light igniting in her eyes.

He nodded.

'Let's go, then…' he said, finally.

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Dean Winchester squinted across the car at Sam, killing the Impala's engine.

'I don't know, Sammy… one crazy girl killing her boyfriend. It sounds like one of those mysteries where appearances really aren't all that deceiving…'

'It says she was perfectly sane right up to the point where she went out with him that night…'

'Everyone's perfectly sane until they start acting crazy…' Dean grumbled.

Sam started to say something, and fell silent. Dean turned, shifting in his seat to look at his brother. 'What?'

Sam blinked, shaking himself. 'Nothing…'

Dean glared at him critically. 'Even Michael seemed like a normal person when we first met him,' he added, feigning carelessness, but squinting shrewdly at Sam so he didn't miss the way his brother's face changed.

Sam bit his lip, and carefully avoided his brother's eye.

Dean sighed. 'Sam, you gotta move on, okay? You have nothing to blame yourself for, we're both fine. Forget about that little bastard, and let it go. I'm going to get us some coffee,' he added, in the same quiet, measured tone. He left Sam chewing his lip in the passenger seat.

Waiting in line, he wondered whether his blunt words would be enough to jolt Sam from the brooding he had fallen into since they had left Michael Andover unconscious on the side of the road. Sam had been fine, for the first day or so after they had driven away, but as often happened with him, hindsight's clearer perception had revealed all the flaws which had so nearly led to disaster for both of them.

The way Dean saw it, nothing that had happened could possibly be Sam's fault. Anyway – no harm done, except for some scars which girls found truly disturbing. Nothing he said convinced the last girl he had met that the still-vivid words carved into his skin were anything other than frighteningly bizarre.

Perhaps Sam just needed a hunt to take his mind off everything. He was willing to investigate the shallow evidence of strangeness in this town, if it would make his brother feel better.

He smiled at an attractive young woman who was walking into the coffee shop. She ignored the gesture, hard-faced and wild eyed. Suspicious, or just offended, he followed her with his eyes – she was trembling, but her walk was purposeful. She stopped uncertainly, eyes flashing with a manic light as she spun round.

In a flurry of movement, too fast for rational thought, she had pulled out a handgun and fired it wildly into the ceiling, above the window, close enough for the vibration to shatter it. Reflexively, the queue and the shop's proprietor hit the ground, as though some switch had pulled their legs out from under them.

'I'm a police officer!' cried the armed woman, spinning erratically.

Hunched low on the polished floor, Dean felt his stomach tense with the unhealthy thrill of danger. _Now what? _She was clearly unstable mentally; any stimulus could be the straw that broke the camel's back, as far as her sanity was concerned. There was a mad light in her eyes; her hair splayed out as she spun, and the round medallion around her neck swung across her chest. Dean swallowed hard, and hurried to get his feet under him so that he could rise slowly, with his hands palm out in front of him. Fast as a frightened rabbit, the girl was facing him, and he found himself staring down the gun barrel, for a few seconds, before the shot rang out, painfully loud in the unnatural silence of the little coffee shop.

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Sam glanced up, an answer on his lips as the door slammed behind Dean. He sighed, and then swallowed, balling and flexing his fingers. He knew that he needed to snap out of the melancholy he had fallen into since they had left Michael Andover behind, but somehow it was difficult, especially knowing that Michael was still out there somewhere, not even that far from here.

He wondered why that particular occasion had scared him so badly – Dean had nearly died, but it wasn't the only time that had happened. A part of him knew he was ashamed of his own uselessness – lying asleep while Dean had been injured, leaving him alone in the hospital, so that even with his chest sewn up and tender, it had been Dean who had to rescue Sam in the end. He had been _worse_ than useless.

Still, he thought, he was only going to enhance that uselessness by brooding, wallowing in self-pity, and, as Dean so helpfully put it, sulking. He took a deep breath and blinked rapidly, trying to physically push the memory away from him.

Blinking, he caught a glimpse of a figure standing maybe twenty feet from the Impala, staring at him. When he opened his eyes again, the figure was gone – no, his back was just disappearing around the corner. Medium height, slender, dark, but moving too quickly to be sure. He told himself – he knew, it was obvious - that he was just being paranoid. He _really_ needed to snap out of this. But, for a moment, he had been certain that he was looking at – well, at Michael.

It took him a full five minutes to tell himself it wasn't him, but eventually he achieved some fragile peace of mind.

A gunshot shattered the quiet of the street, and Sam was out of the car within seconds.

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Ice cold and then furnace hot, pain exploded in Dean's upper arm. He was propelled backwards, and the small of his back collided with the counter. He snatched at it wildly to keep himself upright, gasping, feeling shocked eyes following him.

'Dean!'

Sam was standing, horrified, in the doorway – he had left the car on hearing the first shot, and the second had assaulted his ears as he seized the door handle. As he spoke, the young woman whirled to see him, fixing the barrel on his chest.

Dean knew too well that this woman had no inhibitions with her trigger finger, Dean threw himself at her, snatching at her hair and using his weight to push her down. The gun cracked aloud for a third time, and the bullet buried itself harmlessly in the floor. Dean bit out a curse, rolling over onto his injured arm. The girl's medallion came away in his hand, and he released it, letting the necklace skitter away across the floor. Breathing heavily, he lay back on the ground, right hand clasped tightly around the top of his left arm. He was aware of the people around him breaking their stillness, hesitantly.

He turned his head, and saw something – a spark – fade from his attacker's eyes. She blinked, and sat up slowly, leaving the gun forgotten at her side. Her jaw was tensed in horror, her eyes wide with disbelief. She stared at him, half reaching out a hand, and snatching it back as though bitten. He met her terrified eyes and noted again the change in them.

'Dean! You ok, man?'

Sam crouched beside him, concern and fading lines of fear written in his face. Dean nodded, shrugged one-armed, sat up with Sam's help, still staring at the girl slumped nearby on the floor.

Activity mounted around them; voices asked if he was okay and offered to call an ambulance. He could see blurred figures hurrying through his peripheral vision, hear muted noise, but he was concentrating too hard to process the information of his senses.

She looked up finally, and met his eyes. The glint of mad energy was gone; there was only fear there, now. 'But, I… I…,' she muttered, looking a question at him. He shook his head, frowning: whatever she was asking, he didn't have an answer to give.

'Dean…'

He turned to Sam, nodding. 'I'm ok… Let's get out of here…'

'We should wait for the paramedics, Dean.'

'No way,' Dean replied firmly, staggering to his feet, glad of Sam's supporting hand on his elbow, though he wouldn't say so. 'Sick of hospitals… anyway, it's just a flesh wound – went straight out the other side.'

Sam winced, scrutinising the sleeve of Dean's jacket. There were two holes in it, only two inches apart, so the bullet had at least stayed clear of bone. Even through the leather, he could see an abundance of dark blood welling up through the gap. 'Okay… but if necessary, we'll go to the hospital later on – no, I get to decide,' he added stubbornly, when Dean opened his mouth to protest.

Dean nodded wearily. It was, as he had said, just a flesh wound, but he couldn't help feeling that it would be nice to go a few months without any wounds at all. His left arm hung heavy and useless at his side as they walked back to the car, unheeded in the drama as the police arrived and arrested their stunned colleague. The would throbbed uncomfortably, no doubt pulsing blood out; he could feel it soaking his arm, as well as the tell-tale light-headedness which meant he had already lost more than was wise. Fire and ice seared alternately in his abused flesh. He slumped into the passenger seat of the Impala, cradling his arm in his lap. Those wild, frightened eyes were still bright in his mind's eye.

Nobody noticed a skinny kid retrieving a discarded necklace from the floor of the coffee shop.

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_Review, please. :D I'm asking so nicely! _


	2. A laudable quality

**The Devil you Know**

**Chapter Two**

Dean perched on the edge of the bed nearest the door and waited, fidgeting, for Sam to appear with a bowl of hot water and anti-septic. He pulled his jacket off, stiffly and slowly, sucking air in through his teeth as the leather pulled at the open edges of the wounds in his arm.

Sam winced in sympathy as he emerged from the bathroom, precariously balancing a first aid box, several towels and a bowl of water which he had splashed across his own front. He dropped the first aid box and towels on the floor at Dean's feet, enabling him to set the bowl down without tipping the remaining water out across the bed. Dean smirked, breaking the tension in his facial muscles.

'Graceful, Sammy. Anyone ever tell you you should have been a ballerina?'

Sam half scowled, though another part of him wanted to grin. 'Anyone ever tell you that you should have painted a target on your back and then you wouldn't have to go looking for trouble?' he asked. The bitter sarcasm slipped out of him, unintended.

Dean frowned – or winced, Sam wasn't sure. 'You pissed at me, Sammy?'

Sam chewed his lip, and sighed. 'No, not really. I just wish you'd stop doing that.'

Dean opened his mouth to protest, but Sam cut him off. 'I know it's not your fault… but, I don't know. I have to blame someone, I guess...' Dean raised an indignant eyebrow. 'Anyway,' Sam added, turning again to the half-filled bowl of water, to which he carefully added a generous splash of anti-septic. Dean watched the spirit mix with the warm water and winced again – that was going to sting. Maybe Sam _was _pissed at him. Subconsciously, maybe.

Sam seemed reluctant to touch the wound; he let his hand, holding the soaked towel, hover uncertainly before shooting an apologetic glance at Dean and dabbing firmly at the twin wounds – entry and exit – on his brother's arm. Dean hissed and tensed, tendons standing out on his neck as he willed his arm to keep still. Sam glanced up at him, and saw that his brother's eyes were tightly closed, his face taut as he visibly fought to regain control.

'You alright?' Sam asked, softly. Dean opened his eyes, puffing out a single, shaky breath.

'Yeah… yeah,' he squinted sideways at Sam's concerned expression. 'Yeah, fine… just… ouch.'

'Sorry.'

'S'ok.'

There was a pause. 'You know… I'm going to have to stitch it…'

Dean nodded. His expression was resigned. The temporary sympathy he had felt for his attacker was starting to evaporate.

'We probably have some painkillers…' Sam muttered, lurching to his feet and disappearing once more into the dingy bathroom.

'I'll be ok,' Dean called after him. The crazed girl's horrified eyes were wide open in his mind's eye again. 'Listen, Sam, we should go to the police station. We need to talk to the chick who shot me…'

Sam's head appeared around the edge of the doorframe. 'Why? You think something supernatural…' he trailed off and disappeared again, resuming his noisy rummaging. He was sure there was some Ibuprofen in here somewhere. He really didn't want to attempt those stitches without any chemical aid to smooth the process.

'You didn't see her?' Dean asked, looking up in surprise at the spot where Sam's head had recently been. 'Just after I knocked her over… she looked like she didn't know how she'd got there… It was like she was a different person. Her eyes were different.'

'What, you think she was possessed?' Sam asked, in a muffled voice. 'Ha!' he added, and reappeared, triumphantly clutching a battered Ibuprofen packet. 'I knew we had some.'

There were three left. He handed them to Dean, with a chipped mug full of water. Dean swallowed them greedily, grimacing at the bitter taste they left on his tongue when he couldn't get them down quick enough.

'Seriously,' Sam continued, 'If she was possessed, we would have noticed her spewing up demon in the middle of a coffee shop…'

'Something else, then,' Dean argued absently. 'She was… confused, or lost or something. Before I knocked her over, she was crazy; you could see this… this mad light in her eyes. And then afterwards, she was… just scared, like anyone would be.'

'Okay, so, what do you want to do?' Sam asked, carefully threading a needle. Dean frowned, deep in thought.

'You could go to the police station and… pretend to be her attorney, I guess. That's got to be the best way to talk to her…'

'Me? I can't pretend to a lawyer…' Sam protested, narrowing his eyes to focus on the first wound. Three or four stitches would do it.

'Didn't you spend four years learning _how_ to pretend to be a lawyer? Anyway, _I _can't, people must have seen me – even if the cops didn't, the hole in my shoulder kind of – Jesus, Sammy!' he gasped. 'Some warning?'

'Sorry… I thought it would be better if you were distracted.'

'You thought I wouldn't notice?'

'Well…'

Dean slowly relaxed his fist, which was white-knuckled, having snatched a handful of the bed sheet when the needle had touched him. He took a deep breath, and nodded at Sam to continue, resolving not to snap at his brother again; it wasn't fair.

'I was studying law, not how to pretend to be a lawyer…' Sam muttered indignantly, in delayed reaction to Dean's comment.

'It's not the same?' Dean asked, trying to grin.

Sam growled at him. 'Well, I'll try it,' he conceded, sighing. 'But if I get arrested, it's your fault.'

Dean smirked. 'If you get arrested, it's _your _fault for being a terrible liar…'

'You say that like lying is such a laudable quality,' Sam objected.

'It's useful.'

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'Hi,' Sam offered, in that slightly breathy, awkward tone which Dean _knew_ meant he was lying. 'I'm…' he read the name on the nearest file, and hoped it would be his lucky day. 'I'm Rhiannon West's attorney.' Luckily, the bored duty cop, doodling on the back of an envelope behind the desk, had not yet learned that his new acquaintance was a terrible liar.

'Right, yeah… It's terrible about her; I don't know what happened.'

'How do you mean?'

'Well, she worked here. Cute girl… never would have made a good cop, too nice. But never… She just lost it, man. Of all people, she seems _least_ likely to go off on a killing spree.'

'But she didn't actually kill anyone,' Sam prompted, trying to make it sound like a statement rather than a question.

'Well, no. Shot some guy in the arm, but he disappeared, didn't make a statement. I guess if he doesn't press charges – seems unlikely - you might have an easy job.'

'What?'

'I said you might have an easy job, if that guy doesn't press charges.'

'Oh, right. Yeah,' Sam agreed, remembering that he was a lawyer. 'So, uh, where do I find her?'

'Ok, hang on…' the cop replied, standing up, and kicking back his chair clumsily. Sam followed him down the hall, and smiled his thanks as he slipped into the dull little room where the dark-haired girl he had seen earlier sat slumped and miserable at a metal table.

The duty cop quirked an eyebrow at his colleague as he shut the door behind Sam. 'Hell, I _hope_ that guy she shot doesn't turn up and press charges. With _that_ lawyer, she'd go down so fast…'

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Rhiannon didn't immediately look up when Sam entered the room; she remained unmoving, slumped, wrapped in dark thoughts. When he muttered some nondescript introduction, she flicked up her dark-ringed eyes. There was a weary tension in the mines of her face, and her eyes were still glazed with horror and unshed tears.

She blinked, and studied Sam critically, then swallowed, seeming to reach a conclusion.

'Is he ok?' she asked, her voice raw and hoarse.

'Who?' Sam started to ask, but stopped himself, acknowledging that his masquerade had failed to convince her. He nodded. 'He's alright. No permanent damage…' He was almost reluctant to tell her that Dean was fine; he didn't want to absolve her of guilt, and he was unconvinced by Dean's theory that she had been possessed or controlled by some supernatural agent.

'I'm sorry…' she croaked, glancing away from him, shifting nervously in her seat. 'I didn't mean… honestly, please believe I didn't want to hurt anyone.'

'Then why _did _you?' Sam asked, sitting down opposite her, struggling to keep the hostility out of his voice.

She met his eyes frankly, a muscle twitching in her jaw. She looked afraid of him. Clasped on the table, her hands trembled. 'I don't know. I don't remember.'

'What?' Sam shot back, sounding sceptical.

'I have no memory of anything… since… well, since just after we arrested Lucy Henshall, until I was sitting on the floor in that shop, with a gun next to me. Tell me I'm crazy,' she challenged him, a defiant, desperate light coming into her eyes.

Sam studied her face: tired, pale and drawn, but the stubborn glare she wore seemed to have shadows of honesty in it. Maybe she _had_ been possessed: perhaps some demons were expelled in a more subtle manner than those Sam was familiar with. 'What do you remember – I mean, what's the _last_ thing you can remember, before the blank spot?'

She nodded, as if to herself, and looked up at the grey ceiling as she tried to recall. 'We caught up with Lucy… and she was like I've never seen her. Mad – really, truly mad, no inhibitions, no flicker of who she usually is. We literally had to bring her in by force, and she struggled all the way. I interviewed her in here, and there was no… no remorse, nothing. I mean, she _loved _Paul – that's her boyfriend – and yet she was laughing… telling me how she killed him like he meant nothing to her. Like she was _proud_ of it,' Rhiannon added, crinkling her forehead and twisting her lips at the horror of it.

'And then… did she… say anything?'

'She told me she wanted to tell me a secret… but then she wouldn't tell me, insisted that she whisper it in my ear. I didn't want to go up to her… the way she was acting, I didn't want to be in the same _state_. But I went up to her, and she was fiddling with this medallion round her neck. When my head was close enough, she threw the chain of her necklace over my head, so it was tying us together almost. She said to me, "have fun," and then she pulled her own head out of the circle…'

Rhiannon trailed off, fixing Sam once again in her glassy stare. 'I don't even remember the end of the interview.'

'Have you still got this necklace, Rhiannon?' Sam asked, urgently.

She shook her head. 'No, I haven't seen it since.'

'What did it look like?'

She shrugged, and looked up at the ceiling again, licking her lips. 'Aahh… it was a brass pendant on a gold chain. The pendant was like a ring with a teardrop inside, and a line across it, like…' She drew the shape with a finger on the tabletop.

'Here-,' Sam held out a scrap of paper and a pen. She sketched the symbol roughly onto it, then looked up at him and frowned.

'Why are you so interested in the necklace?' she demanded.

'I… well, there seems to be some link between you wearing the necklace and the time you can't remember,' he explained.

'So where is it now?' she asked. 'Did somebody take it off me in the shop?'

'I'll look for it…,' Sam replied, his mind racing with possibilities. It seemed, either this medallion was cursed, or it had a spirit tied to it which was driving people to homicide. 'Do you know whether I could talk to Lucy?'

'Trust me, you won't get any sense out of Lucy,' she warned. 'She's barely even human any more…'

'But she was wearing the necklace before she gave it to you…'

Her eyes, if possible, widened, picking up the sparse grey light which filtered into the narrow cell. 'Are you trying to tell me that this is a magic necklace which drives the wearer insane?' she requested, her voice trembling with a nervous, disbelieving laugh.

_Yes, pretty much…_ 'To be honest… I wouldn't dismiss that possibility,' Sam admitted, making a valiant effort to be diplomatic about this revelation.

She caught air in her mouth and gaped, fish-like, turning her eyes to the ceiling as if hoping to find the words _you're dreaming _written there. She glanced to both sides, still apparently seeking someone who would contradict this information. 'Right,' she said eventually, in a forced, high-pitched voice. A shaky breath left her quivering lips. 'Lucy must be in a holding cell, somewhere, awaiting trial. Do you really think…?'

'I think… it's likely.'

'My God. She killed her boyfriend… I can't even imagine…' She shook her head, unable to articulate the sentiment. Sam nodded. He could imagine it.

He stood up to go, and she called him back in the doorway.

'I have to ask – your friend…?'

'My brother.'

She swallowed; somehow, that made it worse.

'Is he going to… do you think he'll press charges?'

Sam gritted his teeth. If it had been _him_ who had been shot, Dean would not be so forgiving. The fact that his brother _would_ forgive her left a bitter taste in his mouth. Still, it wasn't her fault – at least, it seemed that way. He still wasn't ready to entirely absolve her from blame.

'No. I'm pretty sure he won't.'

'Thank you. And – Sam?'

'Yes?'

'Just… find that necklace… in case… Before anyone else can put it on.'

He nodded, and let the door swing loudly shut behind him.

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Michael tangled the gold cord round his fingers, and held the dangling pendant up in front of his eyes. The feeble light, strained through the mud-coloured curtains of his rented room, left a pale smudge along one side of the tarnished brass symbol. His fingertips tingled, perceiving the faint buzzing coming off the object. It intrigued and infuriated him in almost equal measure. Intrigued because the entertainment he had witnessed today suggested it had the power to make people act erratically – and, more intriguing still, violently. Infuriated, because he couldn't figure it out, and his psychic ability had guttered almost out – once, he would have known what the neckalce was at a touch, at a glance.

And yet, it was true what they said; every cloud has a silver lining. He didn't want to spoil the surprise, after all. He had a pretty good idea who he wanted to test it on.

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_Please review… It will help me write quicker. _


	3. Recovered from homicidal insanity

**The Devil You Know**

**Chapter Three**

The door slammed with a loud, sharp thud behind Sam as he strode into the motel room. Dean glanced up guiltily, snatching his hand away from scratching at his injured arm. Sam narrowed his eyes disapprovingly, but said nothing.

'So, you haven't been arrested,' Dean commented. 'Congratulations, you must be improving.'

Sam ignored the comment, privately reflecting that he _might _have been arrested, if the duty cop had been paying attention. 'She doesn't remember shooting you,' he reported.

Dean nodded, as though he had expected that. 'Demon?'

Sam shook his head firmly. 'No. Last thing she remembers is talking to Lucy Henshall.'

'That's the girl that killed her boyfriend?'

'Yeah. And Lucy gave Rhiannon – that's her name, the girl who shot you - she gave her her necklace. And that's when Rhiannon lost it.'

'Her memory?'

Sam shrugged. 'And her sanity.'

Dean frowned for a second, then turned his eyes up to meet Sam's: 'I think I pulled her necklace off her when I pushed her over,' he said.

'Well, what happened to it?' Sam asked, brightening.

'I don't know, man. I didn't know it was important.'

Sam sighed. He tapped his fingers absently on the table, thinking. 'We should talk to Lucy. And we need to find the necklace, before someone else puts it on.'

Dean nodded.

'Lucy was transferred to a secure hospital yesterday, I asked the cops. But, she'll be pretty coherent now, assuming that the necklace theory is right…'

'Ok… you go back to the coffee shop, and look for the necklace. I'll talk to Lucy,' Dean suggested.

Sam nodded, oddly grateful that Dean wasn't going to return to the coffee shop.

'Just don't touch the damn thing, ok? We don't know whether you _have_ to be wearing it…'

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'I need to see Lucy Henshall,' Dean announced, striding confidently up to the reception desk which was the only furniture in the drab hallway. A mousy haired woman in her forties looked up from her paperwork and eyed him critically, chewing her pen.

'Who are you?'

'I'm her cousin.'

Some hardness melted in her eyes. 'Sorry hun. I really don't think I can let you see her.'

'Why not?' Dean demanded, impatience lending a breathless quality to his voice which sounded uncannily like desperation.

'She's top security…'

'Look,' he said, leaning across the desk and fixing her apologetic eyes with an intense green stare. 'She's not got anyone else to talk to… the rest of the family – well, they just don't know what to say. I don't know what made her do it, but… she'll be tearing herself up right now. If I don't see her…' He left the ending hanging. An accomplished liar, he knew that what you didn't say was often as convincing as what you did. He failed to understand how Sam could be so incompetent in that department – after all, he had learned from the best.

She chewed her lip, her kind eyes reflecting his feigned anguish with such compassion that he almost felt guilty for lying. She nodded. 'Ok, I'll turn a blind eye. She's in room twenty-eight, down there, turn left. The door opens when you press the catch next to the lock… She hasn't been very responsive. I hope she'll talk to you.'

'Thank you,' he said, looking her right in the eyes to show he meant it.

Lucy Henshall was curled into a ball on her narrow bed, her back to him, and she didn't shift when he pushed the door open; she showed no sign of having noticed his arrival.

'Lucy?' he asked softly, reluctant to break the charged silence. He felt a profound state of intrusion. This girl had killed her boyfriend, and he was interrupting that unimaginable grief. He wouldn't blame her for ignoring him. He was actually surprised when she rolled over and sat up.

'Yes,' she replied flatly. Her eyes were grey and cold, and there was a heavy weariness in her movements: her face was pale, stony and dry, but something was dead behind her eyes.

Dean chewed his lip, frowning with helpless pity: he didn't know how to save her from this. 'I'm sorry,' he muttered, raw-voiced.

She met his eyes, and he tensed to prevent the shudder which tried to run up his spine. There was nothing in those eyes. After staring at him for a few seconds she seemed to come to her senses, and blinked, casting her eyes down to examine her own tangled fingers. 'What can I do for you?' she asked quietly.

'I'm…' He knew he was a good liar, but he couldn't bring himself to lie to her. 'I'm trying to work out what made you do... what you did.'

She glanced up at him sharply, and gestured for him to sit; he took the chair and faced her, perching on the bed. She waited silently for him to continue.

'Well... you're going to think I'm crazy,' he warned her. It sounded like something Sam would say.

Half a bitter laugh forced itself out through her twisted lips. She offered him a tight smile, and shook her head tautly.

'OK. You were wearing a necklace, when you… well, when you killed him.' Not saying the words didn't make it better. 'Then, according to Rhiannon West, you put it on her. And then _she…_lost it. Ran wild in a coffee shop with a gun.'

'I remember,' Lucy cut in suddenly. 'I don't remember killing him. I remember Paul gave me a necklace, and then I remember being in a police cell, and she attacked me.'

'Who?'

'Rhiannon West. They had to pull her away from me. I heard the other cop trying to calm her down. "I know you're upset, I understand."'

Dean frowned.

'That's what he said. And I started to wonder what I'd done.'

'Jesus.'

She nodded mutely.

'Well, I think the necklace caused it. Caused you both to go crazy. Anything you can tell me about where it came from, what it is… it might help us to make sure it doesn't happen to anyone else.'

'Where is it now?' she demanded, with sudden, surprising sharpness.

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Sam walked into the coffee shop, ducking under a ladder as he stepped through the doorway. It was closed for repairs, and a couple of workmen were in the act of replacing the shattered window. The owner, looking weary, was leaning against his counter dejectedly, watching. He glanced up when Sam came in.

'We're not open today, son. Sorry… There was some damage done yesterday needs clearing.'

'Yeah, I'm sorry. I just needed to ask you… My friend, um, lost a necklace, and she's, uh, she's really worried about it. It's been in her family… for generations. And she thinks she might have dropped it here, so I was wondering if you'd seen it.' He finished in a rush, his voice unnaturally high, wishing he had prepared his story before he came in.

The proprietor shrugged. 'I haven't seen anything… do you know what it looks like?'

Sam produced the scrap of paper on which Rhiannon had drawn the pendant, and the other man studied it, shaking his head.

'We had a bit of drama here yesterday... it could easily have gone unnoticed. Feel free to have a look around.'

'Thanks.'

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Dean shrugged apologetically. 'My brother's looking for it. We're not going to let anyone else put it on.'

She nodded. 'Paul told me it was his mother's, when he gave it to me. I don't know anything else about it.'

'Has Paul's mother recently recovered from homicidal insanity?' Dean asked. He regretted being so flippant when her face tensed.

'You could say that. She was in a mental institution. And she's just died, maybe three weeks ago.'

A silence fell.

'Where was she buried?' Dean asked automatically.

She frowned at him. 'What?'

'Well… it's possible that her spirit is… haunting… the necklace. If we burn her -,' he wanted to say bones, but, three weeks? The thought of digging up a rotting body turned even his hardened stomach. 'Her body,' he continued, 'then she won't be able to haunt it any more. It'll just be harmless jewellery.'

Her stony face didn't twitch. She seemed to be beyond shock. He stared at her, searching in vain for a reaction. He realised it would make him feel better if she told him he was raving: this stillness was chilling.

'She refused to be buried in the churchyard; hated religion, even when she was sane. But I could show you where, Paul took me there once.'

'She's not in a graveyard?' Dean asked anxiously.

She shook her head; no.

'Shit.'

'What?'

'Well, spirits usually have some limitations – holy water, salt, iron – because they're buried in hallowed ground. If she's not… she'll be… less vulnerable.'

'Meaning?'

'I don't think we'll be able to destroy the necklace unless we destroy the spirit first.'

'I can show you where she is,' Lucy repeated, with a determined light in her eyes.

Dean gestured at the heavy door. 'You can't just tell me where?'

She shook her head firmly. 'I'll know the place when I see it, but…'

'Right.'

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Sam studied the floor of the coffee shop inch by inch, but found nothing. The shop's proprietor helped him scour the kitchens and restrooms in the same way, in case the necklace had been kicked out of the main room in the general confusion. Nothing.

Stepping outside, he started to wander the streets surrounding the coffee shop, but hope was withering inside him. He hoped that Dean would find another way to prevent the effects of the pendant spreading any further.

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Dean opened the cell door inch by inch and stuck his head out, yanking in back in when footsteps clacked around the corner.

'You must have told them some lie to get in here. Can't you claim you're transferring me or something?'

'I told them I was your cousin,' he replied shortly. The footsteps faded, and he swallowed hard as he stepped out into the corridor. Lucy followed him silently, keeping close to his back.

They edged along the corridor, trying to be utterly silent while still not looking too conspicuous. Dean wasn't entirely sure how quizzing Lucy Henshall on the origins of the necklace had become helping her escape from the secure hospital. He hated this chaotic feeling of not being in control – it was only justified when copious amounts of alcohol were involved.

At length they reach the door connecting the corridor to the grey reception area, and Dean peered carefully through the meshed window to see that the receptionist was still sitting idle behind her desk, scribbling absently on the corner of an envelope.

Dean looked back at Lucy, who waited expectantly behind him. Her cold eyes met his impatiently.

'Wait here,' he hissed. 'I'll wave at you when it's safe to make a run for it…'

She nodded indifferently.

He slipped through the door and approached the desk again; the receptionist looked up and smiled sympathetically when she saw him.

'How was she?'

He sighed, chewing his lip. 'I don't know… well, she was talking, but she wouldn't really let me in… She's sort of… retreated inside herself…' he invented frantically, drawing on the truth, because the best lies are those which are mostly true.

'Oh, honey…' replied the middle aged woman, visibly welling up. 'I just don't know what to say.'

Dean waved one arm wildly behind his back, putting on an expression of noble suffering for the benefit of the receptionist. He winced inwardly at the soft patter of footsteps behind him, and when it had disappeared he offered a brave smile.

'Well… thanks,' he said.

She nodded tearfully, and he left. Lucy was waiting stone-faced in the parking lot.

'Let's go then…'

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Sam wandered around the building to seek the medallion in the alleyways behind the coffee shop. He had lost nearly all hope of finding it here, but something in his nature compelled him to search thoroughly before dismissing the idea. The streets were narrow and deserted.

A glint of gold at the base of a dustbin caught his attention, and his heart tensed with unexpected excitement. Striding over, he bent to investigate.

Litter crackled between his fingers, and the thrill dissolved rapidly in his chest. He half sighed, half growled, and slumped, still crouching beside the dustbin.

He jerked, and nearly lost his balance, when a voice sounded behind him.

'Is this what you're looking for, Sam?'

Stomach in his mouth, he spun round, so fast his vision blurred. And the world went white as a pale fist collided with his face.

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_Forgive me the slow update…life has been crazy. It should calm down in a week or so, so I hope my update speed will improve. Thank you all for your patience. _


	4. Slipping in his grasp

**The Devil You Know**

**Chapter Four**

Dean sat tense and uncomfortable in his own car, Lucy's cold presence beside him making him shift his eyes from the road every few seconds to cast suspicious sideways glances in her direction. She directed him out of town into sparse woodlands. Eventually, in the same flat, emotionless voice, she told him to pull over, and he obeyed doubtfully.

They slammed the Impala's doors, and Lucy set off silently, away from the road. Dean watched her back stalk away from him, reflecting that there was some tension and purpose in her movement which was strangely unsettling: he was convinced that she had some intention she hadn't told him about. He regretted helping her escape, but it was too late now. He sighed, hefting a shovel from the Impala's trunk, and followed her, kicking out at the scrubby tufts of grass in frustration.

Her form seemed dark and severe among the vibrant yellow-tan colours of the grass and the ground; sunlight seemed to fall around her without settling in her lank hair. Dean wondered why anyone would want to be buried out here in the middle of nowhere: the town was little more than a careless grey scattering across the valley. The sickly foreboding clawing at his stomach became more persistent.

He jogged a few steps to catch up with Lucy, who had stopped, and waited expectantly beside a scrap of land starved of the thin grass which covered the rest of the hillside in uneven patches.

'This is the place,' she told him. He smiled awkwardly and nodded, dodging her empty stare.

For a few moments she watched him dig, and then seemed to lose interest, and wandered among the trees. Dean was too relieved that her eyes were off him to ask where she was going. And too tired. His arm was throbbing, and sweat trickled into the wound, making it sting so sharply that his eyes watered. He had achieved nearly five feet in depth when a particularly fierce pang made him drop the shovel and clutch at his arm, lurching upright and swearing in a hoarse undertone.

He tilted his head back, drinking in air, then stopped abruptly and glanced around. Lucy had disappeared, obscured by trees. He swore again, and wrenched himself laboriously out of the hole.

The trees thickened around him as he jogged in the direction he believed Lucy had gone, shadows joining up until the light was muted and dusky. This darkness, and the upwards lilt of the land, prevented him from seeing the quarry until it opened up at his feet. He snatched at a tree trunk and scrabbled backwards in panic, kicking some sandy soil over the cliff edge. Regaining his balance gracelessly, he looked up, and his frantic eyes found Lucy.

She stood with her toes on the edge, upright as a dancer preparing to leap, her arms outstretched and her face tilted ecstatically to the wind, her eyes closed. She looked human; for the first time since Dean had met her, she looked like her soul was still living inside her, ironically. For the second time, he felt a deeply buried part of him repel the idea of interrupting her meditations. But he knew he couldn't, wouldn't stand and watch her jump, or walk away and let her do as she pleased. The compulsion to save her was almost hardwired into his DNA. Still, a part of him wondered whether this was the only way she could be saved.

'Lucy…' he croaked, afraid that a loud noise would surprise her into movement.

She didn't look at him, but her eyes opened, and her face contracted in pain. 'I'm sorry, I lied to you. I don't know where Paul's mother is buried. But please understand I need to do this…' she pleaded. There were tears in her voice. This pain was honest, it was natural; it wasn't the same as the robotic suffering she had exuded before.

Dean took a wary step forward. 'I know it hurts…' he began, but her choked sob stopped him. Every word she spoke seemed to be wrenched from her gut.

'I killed the man I loved. I can't live the rest of my life knowing that. I can't…'

'Lucy, it wasn't you,' he reassured her, shuffling nearer.

She glanced at him over her shoulder, and pushed her feet forwards, a fraction of an inch, but still, his breath caught sharply in his windpipe. 'Please, stay back,' she warned him, teetering dangerously.

'Listen… I know it's hard… but Paul wouldn't want you to kill yourself, Lucy. If he loved you, he'd want you to go on living, right?'

She turned her face resolutely away from him, shutting out the words. It was clear in her mind. The person she had become was a killer, and she couldn't live this person's life; there was nothing in it that she recognised.

Dean swallowed, and tried another angle. 'Lucy it's possible that Paul's mother wasn't haunted by the necklace... it could be an older spirit. It's likely that Paul worked it out… He gave you the necklace, knowing that it would ruin your life, Lucy,' Dean told her, with utter conviction, not knowing whether what he said was true or not. He had no qualms about speaking ill of the dead if it would save a young woman's life. 'He did this to you, Lucy… the son of a bitch isn't worth dying for.'

She turned horrified eyes on him. Some new emotion was glowing in her eyes. 'He was so strange that night… he was afraid, almost, to give me the gift…' she muttered incredulously, as though to herself. Dean risked another step towards her. Her weight seemed to shift near imperceptibly away from the edge.

'But why would he do that?' she asked. Her voice now was that of a lost child, shattered illusions collapsing around her.

Dean's eyes widened: he had never thought for a second that he might be right, but Lucy's crumbling face told him he had hit bull's-eye. 'I don't know,' he replied honestly. 'But I'll need you to help me find out.'

He met her eyes uncertainly, waiting for a sign that she had made her decision. She nodded, so slightly that he almost missed it.

'Okay…'

He reached out an arm to take her hand, and she pushed back with her feet, reaching out to catch his hand. The loose earth shifted under her feet, and they slipped out from beneath her. In a frantic dive, Dean caught her forearm in his fingers, and clutched it tight as she slipped backwards, pulling his sprawled form along the sandy ground with her weight. Dean dug his toes into the ground, and the friction was enough to halt the movement.

He lay full length on the ground, clinging tightly to her arm. He was all too conscious that his fingers were still sweaty and dirty from digging the hole, and even now her skin was slipping in his grasp. The wound in his arm screeched out in indignation as his muscles tensed desperately, and he knew he couldn't keep this up for long. Her eyes met his, so vivid with fear that he doubted she could have jumped at all.

She mumbled incoherently, drowning in terror.

'I've got you… I've got you,' he muttered. His toes lost purchase in the sand, and they slid a few inches before he could stop them again, pressing knees and toes desperately into the earth.

Buried in a pocket of his jeans and inaccessible, his cell phone buzzed insistently. The intrusive sound seemed to add to the urgency of the situation.

He swung an arm round, and managed to catch hold of her free hand. 'I need you to push yourself up,' he told her breathlessly. 'You won't fall,' he added. For the second time, he was stating as fact something which could be either truth or lies. In a lot of ways, it was harder than lying.

She scrabbled her knees weakly against the cliff face, and her movement caused them to slip another few inches. Dean realised that, locked together like this, if she fell, he would follow.

'Let go of me with one arm,' he said.

She looked at him in horror and shook her head firmly. 'I won't let you fall!' he repeated. 'But you have to climb, or we'll both go over. Please…'

Holding his eyes in a vivid stare, she slowly retracted her hand from his, relying entirely on his weakening grip on her forearm. Her fingers dug into the sand, and she pushed up with her foot from a rut in the cliff-wall. She lurched forward, managing to twist her leg and get one knee up onto the ground. Snatching wildly, her hand caught a fistful of Dean's shirt. His free arm caught her waist and pulled her towards him. They both collapsed panting on the ground.

Dean's phone, which had fallen silent, started up its insistent ringing again. Wearily, he pulled it out. Predictably, it was Sam.

'Hello?'

The voice on the other end was inaudible, but Lucy watched Dean's expression tense.

'What?' he demanded.

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Sam opened his eyes to a bright light, which blurred all around it into vague shapes of dark grey and black. It hurt to look at it, and he squinted out feebly, trying to focus the world into something his injured brain could process. The light was flicking on and off. He shook his head to clear it, and winced: there seemed to be half a brick trapped in his skull battering the sides of his head mercilessly at the smallest movement. He blinked, hard, and finally, the shapes started to resolve themselves into objects.

He seemed to be back in their motel room, sitting bolt upright in a hard wooden chair, half blinded by the low rays of the setting sun, seeping into the dismal room through the grimy window panes, and giving an ethereal glow to the dreary décor. The light was flicking on and off because, far too close to his eyes, something was swinging back and forth across his vision. He tried to lift a hand to swat away the irritation, but something prevented him. Blinking again, he looked down to see his hands bound securely to the wooden armrests with coarse rope. He tested the tightness of the bonds cautiously, and swore under his breath.

He flicked his eyes back to the swinging object in front of his eyes. It suddenly occurred to him that somebody must be holding it up, and his head pivoted wildly, searching for them.

Michael snatched the pendant up with his free hand, and crouched in front of Sam, grinning from ear to ear. Childishly, Sam spat at him; it made him feel better in a minor way. Michael snarled.

'Is this what you were looking for, Sam?' he demanded, opening his hand to show the medallion resting against his palm, its chain tangled round his fingers.

Sam said nothing, but stared at him angrily. His stomach lurched at the sight of the dangerous object in such dangerous hands.

Michael produced Sam's cell phone. 'Let's call your brother,' he said, dialling. He held the phone to Sam's ear.

'What do you want me to say?' Sam asked, suspicious, listening to the droning ring. Dean wasn't picking up.

Michael shrugged mutely, hard-eyed.

It went to voicemail.

Michael growled and dialled again. 'Seems your brother doesn't care about you, Sam,' he muttered angrily.

After five or six tones, Dean's voice cut in. _'Hello?_'

'Dean, Michael's here,' Sam said frankly. It seemed best to let Dean know the truth, so that he could work out a plan. Michael, surprisingly, didn't appear to mind that Sam was giving the game away.

'_What?'_

'Michael, you remember? He's here.'

'_Here, as in "in town"?'_

'No, Dean, here, as in "in our motel room, with me".'

'_There's a time to be sarcastic, Sam, and this isn't it…'_

'Dean, do I sound like I'm joking?'

'_You're serious…?'_

'I'm tied to a chair, dude.'

'_I'm on my way.'_

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Dean rolled over, his hand going automatically to his arm, which still throbbed fiercely. Lucy looked at him, and her mouth moved soundlessly. She was still too frightened to speak.

'We've got to go…'

On the spur of the moment, Dean could think of no alternative but to take her with him. If he returned her to the mental hospital, she wouldn't be available for help later, and a part of him felt that she didn't really deserve it, despite the suicide attempt. Anyone would be messed up, if they had been through what she had been through. Anyway, there was no time for a detour.

Less than a minute later, the Impala kicked up dust and roared aloud as it sped away.

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'I think this would suit you, Sam,' Michael taunted, perched, grinning, on the edge of Dean's bed. The necklace was swinging hypnotically from his fingers.

Sam swore, and leaned back into the chair, away from Michael, as the realisation sunk in. He had called Dean here, and Michael was going to set him upon his brother like a rabid dog: it was the perfect revenge. He cursed himself for failing to see it; he had been so reckless, on the phone, giving Dean the truth. A lie might have protected him.

Michael placed a knife – Dean's knife, stolen from the duffel bag lying open halfway under the bed – on the table in front of Sam, and carefully turned the handle towards the captive. Sam stared at it in horror.

The sound of the Impala tyres screeching to a hasty halt reached Sam's ears.

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Dean yanked the handbrake on, and the Impala spun to a stop with a sound which seared his eardrums. He glanced at Lucy.

'Stay here. Whatever happens, please don't do anything. Duck down if anyone comes close.'

She nodded mutely. She hadn't said a word since he had pulled her away from the quarry's edge. But her cheeks were wet now, which was a relief to him; it was a natural, familiar type of grief, whereas before, it had been like a zombie sitting beside him.

He hovered for a fraction of a moment, but his concern for Sam quickly overrode his concern for Lucy. It was selfish; he wasn't proud of it, but Sam would always come first.

He snatched a gun from the trunk, hardly stopping to check if it was loaded before striding off towards the door of the motel room.

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Michael approached with exaggerated slowness, holding the chain open ready to slip over Sam's neck.

'Don't you dare…. No, no…' Sam muttered frantically, recoiling as it came closer.

As the chain fell past his eyes, a veil seemed to fall over his vision. Most of his normal thoughts were muted, like frantic yelling heard from underwater, and a single emotion dominated his being so fully that all self-awareness fell away.

He fixed his eyes on the knife on the table in front of him, and as the door opened, the ropes binding him loosened, and he snatched up the knife. He pulled somebody towards him and pressed the knife against their throat, desperate to expel the anger which was consuming him.

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Dean kicked the door open without bothering to check if it was locked, revealing a frantic scene. It took him a few moments to make sense of what was going on, and by that time, the scene had settled into a frightening tableau. Sam stood in front of a kicked-over chair, holding Michael against his chest with one arm, while the other pressed a knife against the teenager's throat. Not hard enough to draw blood, but hard enough that the skin around was white with the pressure. Before he saw the chain on Sam's neck, Dean knew what had happened.

Michael's pale face was livid with shock, anger and fear, his eyes flashing with disbelief at the disastrous backfiring of his plan. He stared at Dean, and their eyes met.

Dean was torn, suspended in a split-second's silence. He knew that the necklace's agents didn't wait too long before action; the throbbing hole in his arm was a testament to that. It would be so easy, and so satisfying, to let Sam kill Michael. Sam's recent brooding and the scars still visible on his own chest were a constant reminder of their grievance against him, and he personally had no qualms about the kid's death. But Sam wasn't a killer, and Dean couldn't let him become one: he needed Sam's innocence to balance his own disillusion.

His breath caught in his throat, and the tiny sound seemed to break the freeze-frame. Time to act -

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_I love reviews, and they do make me write faster! _


	5. Time to act

**The Devil You Know**

**Chapter Five**

_Time to act – _

_Time to act, now, damn it!_

Dean's finger relaxed on the trigger: he couldn't shoot Michael without risking Sam, and shooting Sam had never really been an option. Time was running out: Sam's face, tensed with borrowed hatred, turned away from him, and the muscles of his arm contracted, preparing to move.

Dean did the only thing he could think of; it wasn't a good plan, but in that second, it seemed the best of a bad lot. The least of a whole range of evils –

He turned the gun in his hand and threw it, hard and accurate, straight at Sam's forehead. Not hard enough to knock him out, but hard enough to make him lurch backwards, releasing Michael from the knife.

There was a burst of movement. Sam staggered back, cursing, ducked, and snatched up the gun from the floor, spinning as he rose to his feet. Dean swore – not such a brilliant plan. He seized Michael by the upper arm and pushed him forcefully towards the open bathroom door. It was the nearest cover available. Dean plunged after him, rolling on the floor and kicking the door closed as he fell. Three shots rang out, painfully loud and sharp, and he felt one of them graze the side of his neck; the other two made splintered dents in the thick wooden door. He flicked the lock and searched wildly for something heavy to lean against the door to keep his brother out. He cursed his luck at being in a bathroom; all the heavy furniture was fixed securely to the walls and floor.

Another shot, slightly muffled, slammed into the wood, making the hinges rattle ominously. Dean threw his own weight against it, just in time – Sam's kick thudded loudly against the other side. Dust rained down on Dean's head. Apparently, this solution was temporary at best.

Michael picked himself up from the bathroom floor and stared incredulously at Dean, who was struggling with the trembling door. 'Why would you save my life?' he demanded. He sounded almost angry.

Dean glared at him. Of all possible activities, being stranded in a bathroom with Michael hiding from a homicidal Sam must feature in at least the bottom three. He grimaced as another bullet lodged in the door, causing splinters to explode out just above his head. The wood was weakening. A few more bullets, and they'd start coming through.

Michael was staring at him without comprehension. 'Why…?' he began again, but his voice gave out. For the first time that Dean could remember, the teenager was looking at him without hatred.

'Sam would tear himself apart if he killed a human being,' he grated out reluctantly. He only conceded grudgingly that Michael belonged to the class 'human being'. Still, he didn't want to let Michael believe he had been saved for his own sake.

He grunted as Sam's weight slammed into the other side of the door.

Michael blinked, and looked away. Dean had a powerful desire to hurl abuse at the young idiot for getting him into this mess, but holding the door took all his energy and concentration. Again, he had the sensation of a moment of electric stillness lodged in the middle of a series of storms.

Not that it was particularly still – Sam's voice could be heard beyond the door, using words Dean had never heard him use before, accusing him of cowardice, trying to get a rise out of him. He shut out the sound determinedly, but phrases filtered to his ears, punctuated with loud thuds, as Sam continued trying to wear down the door.

The moment stretched out; it seemed to go on and on. Dean's mind was too harassed to formulate any satisfactory plan, so he resorted to cheap, childish tricks. Sam's charges against the door had taken on a rhythm. At a strategic moment, he stepped away from the door and unlocked it, ducking away to one side, ignoring Michael's yelp of protest. Sam burst through the door, too full of momentum, and Dean's fist collided powerfully with the side of his head as he passed. He fell, face down.

Another moment of stillness. Events seemed to be unrolling in staccato bursts, interspersed with brief, tense rests. Dean stared down at Sam and breathed out. His eyes met Michael's, in a dangerous warning stare which meant _don't move._

Dean crouched beside his brother, in time to see Sam begin to stir groggily. Hastily, he wrenched the chain free of Sam's neck, glanced up at Michael and pitched it across the room, out of reach. He didn't want to touch it any longer than he had to; the feel of it turned his stomach.

He half dragged, half carried his brother out of the bathroom, and deposited him on the nearest bed. He wasn't comfortable, sitting at Michael's feet. Sam groaned as he sat up, both hands going to his head.

'Mmuh… hurts,' he mumbled.

Dean muttered an apology.

'You back with us?'

Sam looked up. Realisation dawned, slowly, on his face. 'Shit. Oh, shit… I'm going to kill him. What did I do?' His eyes widened suddenly in horror. 'You're bleeding. Oh, my god, not again…'

'What?' Dean raised a tentative hand to touch the spot Sam's eyes were fixed on. Sure enough, a narrow gulley ran along the side of his neck. He remembered feeling a bullet graze him in the confusion. But it was nothing, not a finger's depth. 'Sam, chill, I'm fine. You didn't hurt anyone. Just a door,' he added, trying to lighten the mood. Sam didn't respond to the weak humour.

He studied the tiny wound in minute detail. There was something akin to panic in his eyes. Dean seized him by the shoulders, and forced him to meet his eyes.

'Sam. Look at me, I'm _fine…'_

Sam took a shaky breath, and nodded.

'What's all that about?'

'I just… Jesus, Dean. I just… I don't know, lately… I'm going to have a heart attack, man; I'm really going to lose it if I have to mop up your blood one more time. I know you don't do it on purpose but… Seriously, it's getting out of control. I can't take any more, Dean…'

Dean was surprised, but then he reflected. He remembered looking up at Sam's face through a haze of pain in a dark motel room, remembered Sam's sharp intake of breath as he had pressed the barrel of a gun against his own chest. Remembered, more recently, a tight-faced Sam stitching up his arm, and glaring at him, disproportionately angry with him for scratching at the wound as it began to heal. For a second he tried to empathise, tried to imagine himself watching Sam suffer a series of injuries, but he stopped, pulling his imagination back. It was too painful.

_There are a lot of ways to be selfish, and some of them look selfless on the surface. _He felt strangely guilty. A part of him rebelled- did Sam think he had deliberately got himself stabbed and shot? Another part was sympathetic- he hadn't thought about it from his brother's point of view.

'Okay…' Dean said. 'You won't have to, Sam. I promise. I'm sorry…' The words sounded awkward. He hated making promises he couldn't guarantee to keep.

Sam nodded, appeased, for the moment. 'Where's Michael?' he asked, suddenly, his expression hardening.

'Sitting on the naughty step,' Dean replied absently, turning to see whether Michael was still standing in the bathroom, staring vacantly into space. He wasn't. Dean spun round, and his gaze fell on the teenager, crouching in a corner of the room, studying something on the floor.

Dean cursed. He didn't believe how careless he had been, in his concern for Sam.

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Michael stared after Dean as he dragged Sam out of the cramped bathroom. He found himself awash in painful ambiguity, and wished hard that he could go back to seeing everything in black and white. Shades of grey were unsettling.

He had come here secure in the knowledge that he hated, _hated_ the Winchesters, with a passion, with a fury. He had come with his heart and mind set on revenge, with a lust for blood in his throat. It had been beautiful, pure, he had lived with a clear purpose. Having a purpose, he had found, was nearly as good as belonging to someone; because when you knew exactly what you wanted, you could be utterly self-centred. You could belong to yourself.

And now –

Now, he stood watching the Winchesters. There was a knife at his feet, dropped by Sam as he had collapsed onto the floor. They weren't watching him, wrapped up in their quiet conversation. Heroes of revenge tragedy would have killed for an opportunity like this. '_Now might I do it...' _

And yet… a strange, unfamiliar feeling tugged at him. He hadn't felt it in a long time. He didn't like it, and tried to cast it aside, but it clung to him like a limpet, insistent and stubborn. He couldn't dislodge it.

There was a name for this feeling, but he couldn't bring it to his lips, it hovered in his subconscious. It annoyed him, so much that he could almost work up enough fury to galvanise himself into action. That limpet-feeling pulled him back, though. He growled in frustration.

Staring out into the room, framed by the battered doorframe, a tiny part of the view seemed to swell and brighten until it dominated his vision, and suddenly the answer was clear. The perfect opportunity for revenge was marred by a sense of responsibility to the man who had saved his life – but the solution was there in front of him. A way to suppress conscience- yes, conscience, that was it. He would be better off without it.

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Self-reproach and horror slammed into Dean's head with the knowledge of what Michael was doing, and he was moving almost before the thought was complete in his head; _not again…_

Sam's hand stopped him, catching his wrist anxiously. He spun round and looked back. His little brother was wearing a complicated expression, reproach and concern, exasperation and pleading mixed strangely in his features. He grunted, unable to articulate his objection, and Dean paused a second. _Sorry, Sam…No time to think before I leap, not now… _

He shook Sam's hand off, and plunged on.

Michael slipped the medallion over his neck.

Dean caught the metal symbol in his hand, ready to yank it away.

Michael's knife entered between his last two ribs with smooth, surgical precision.

He gasped and fell back, landing heavily on the floor, clutching both hands to the wound and feeling warm liquid seep out to cover them.

Sam leapt up with a wordless cry of rage; pushed to breaking point. He slammed the teen's wrist violently against the wall, and the knife clattered to the floor. Sam's hands went for Michael's pale exposed throat. He was angry enough to kill.

Dean pulled his dark jacket over his stomach, lurching to his feet. 'Sam, stop, I'm fine –,' he called, desperately. His head spun as he rose, and he came close to falling. Sam looked at him doubtfully, one hand still on Michael's neck.

'I thought…'

'I know… but he missed me. I'm fine,' Dean repeated. He regretted the lie as soon as it left his lips, but it swelled to fill the space between them, and with every passing second it became harder to tell the truth, to contradict himself.

Sam relaxed, his head drooping as he breathed out heavily. 'Thank God,' he breathed.

Dean winced, inwardly.

'I was sure there was blood on the knife…' Sam muttered, turning to check.

Michael was gone. Sam turned in time to see the door slam behind him.

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_Short – sorry. But, action-packed, maybe that makes up for it! You should know how lucky you are that you only got 5 words of Hamlet there… one mention of revenge tragedy, and I nearly went off on a very long tangent…Review, and I will reward you by not mentioning Shakespeare next chapter :D _


	6. Enough already

**The Devil You Know**

**Chapter Six**

Dean clutched surreptitiously at his ribs, trying to look as though he were just crossing his arms. _Jesus,_ that hurt. He could feel warm, sticky liquid seeping into the top of his jeans – _shit, dark coloured clothes only take you so far…_ His strength was falling out of him with the blood, fast, too fast, and in his pain-addled mind a thought surfaced, bright and urgent. He had to get away from Sam, immediately, and sort himself out. This ridiculous charade he had somehow backed himself into could not be escaped without pushing Sam to breaking point, and he couldn't – wouldn't? - couldn't do that. Everything was spiralling out of control, and he couldn't keep track of it with this constant, grating agony between his ribs. Sam was watching him critically.

'Dean?'

'Yeah, sorry,' he replied, blinking, fighting to come out of a reverie.

'We've got to catch Michael, Dean, before he hurts someone else!' Sam insisted, his voice loud and sharp, as though he was losing his patience, trying to make himself understood to a small child or a madman. 'Earth to Dean!' he snapped.

'I, uh…' he fumbled for an excuse, frantic, too slow.

'You what?'

_Lucy! _He'd completely forgotten her, sitting waiting for him in the Impala. He didn't have a clue what he was going to do with her, but for now she seemed to provide a good escape route. 'Sam, I have to take Lucy back to the mental hospital… I forgot about her.'

'You took Lucy Henshall _out _of the mental hospital?'

'I'll explain later, ok?' Dean appealed to his brother, his voice tinged with desperation as he battled with another fierce pang from his ribs. 'We can't go after Michael half-cocked, we've underestimated him enough times already. I need you to research the symbol on the necklace, research Paul Hartshorne's family… look for a pattern. I'll be back.'

He'd slammed the door behind him almost before the last word left his lips. Sam stood gaping at the space Dean had occupied, surprised at Dean's sudden desire to adhere to the Boy Scouts' Golden Rule. He'd never shown any sign of wanting to be prepared for anything, as far as Sam could remember. The urgency of his departure was slightly unsettling, too, but Sam dismissed his concern, conceding that leaving a madwoman to her own devices was generally not a good idea, and also knowing that Dean thought he worried too much, especially recently. He was already slightly ashamed of his outburst: it _wasn't _Dean's fault that he kept ending up in harm's way. More importantly, if Dean thought Sam would have a mental breakdown at the sight of his blood, he was likely to start hiding injuries, and there was no happy end to that story, Sam knew.

He resolved to apologise when Dean returned, and slumped resignedly in front of his laptop. He could almost feel time ticking away in the back of his head: he needed to suss out this necklace before Michael did something truly destructive. After all, Michael Andover was unstable enough already; no need of the supernatural to make him a danger to society.

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Dean staggered over to the Impala and dropped into the car, jolting the wound as he fell heavily into the seat. He cried out softly, hunching in on himself instinctively, pressing his eyes closed.

'My God! - Oh, it's you… Jesus… you scared the hell out of me. A guy ran past just now with a knife! What the hell is going on?' Semi-hysterical, it took her a moment to take in his hunched posture, uneven breathing and anguished face. When she looked, her eyes went impossibly wide, and she gaped helplessly for a second. 'What... happened?' she asked, in a small voice, interrogative manner falling away as terror set in, filtering into her innocent eyes and permeating the small-town, girl-next-door beauty of her delicate features. This sort of thing didn't – shouldn't – happen to Lucy Henshall.

'I need your help,' he gasped out.

Panic clawed at her; her stomach churned uncomfortably. 'What… what can I do?'

Dean reached into his jacket. He had never, never considered doing this before, but he had rarely felt less in control than he did right now: a madman on the loose, rendered doubly mad by a deadly artefact, Sam alone and vulnerable, trying to hide a wound from his brother with only a potentially unstable former murderess for an ally, even as he clung to reality with his fingernails, and felt it all slipping away. Trembling with unexplained chills, he fished out the car keys and handed them to Lucy.

'Just drive somewhere safe…' he muttered.

'And then what? Did I mention the guy with the knife…?' she glanced at the dark stain spreading across his shirt and down his jeans, and swallowed, hard. She decided not to mention that she sometimes fainted at the sight of blood. 'What if he gets somebody else?' she demanded.

'I…' Dean shook his head, floundering. 'I don't know. I just need time, to stop the bleeding, and… and think…'

'Did you find the necklace?' she asked, her voice tense with desperation.

He shook his head. 'Failed on all counts,' he mumbled. God, but it hurt to move. He shifted painfully over into the passenger seat, while Lucy sprinted round the car. Every move she made was suffused in panic.

Her hand shook so violently that she struggled to push the key into the ignition. Then, she stalled the engine.

'Couldn't we stitch you up here?' she asked hopefully. 'I mean… that guy's gone, at least for now.

Dean shook his head, wearily, but firmly. A thought occurred to him suddenly, through a mist of pain. 'Just tell me you know how to drive.'

'I don't have my licence yet. I… I'm learning. I never drove an old car before…'

Dean's stomach lurched, and for a fraction of a second, his vision went pure white. 'Jesus…' he choked. 'Just… try…'

'Jesus,' she echoed, swallowing again.

Eventually, she managed to pull out of the parking lot. 'Where are we going?'

'Away from people.' Dean breathed, shivering violently, balled up against the door. 'Away from here.' He wanted to put off the moment when he would have to inspect the wound, but like so many things, it would only get worse the longer he left it. He nearly blacked out, leaning down to find the first-aid box under the seat, and again as he straightened. His head swam nauseously, and he clutched the handle above the door as though the solidity of it would anchor him to this world, maybe make it stop swaying.

Lucy glanced across at him, and looked back quickly. She couldn't faint, not now.

Breathing uncertainly through his teeth, Dean leaned back and slowly, carefully, _painfully_ peeled back his shirt. He was a mess, layers of flaky, congealing, and dried blood stuck his clothes to him, even as fresh dribbles crept through and dripped onto his hands. He tried to look at it indifferently, as though it were someone else's flesh, but he felt every touch, every fraction's movement, so vividly, it was impossible.

He didn't know where to start. His head was spinning too fast, there was too much blood, there was too much else going on, he couldn't concentrate. His grip on reality was slipping. He imagined hanging off the edge of the quarry by his fingernails, feeling them strain against their sockets, about to be yanked out, feeling the loose earth shift beneath them. Maybe he was falling already; either way, he didn't know where he was going to land…

He mopped at his stomach, to little effect. Pressing on the wound hurt too much; he couldn't clear the blood unless he cleaned it properly, and he couldn't do that without passing out.

A playground car park loomed on the left, deserted in the gathering dusk. 'Pull over,' Dean choked out.

Lucy swung the wheel erratically between her hands, and he lurched sideways to steady it. They narrowly avoided the gatepost at the entrance. Not trusting Lucy's breaking, Dean yanked the handbrake up, and the Impala spun and skidded to a halt.

Lucy sat stunned, panting. Dean slumped into her lap.

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It occurred to Sam rapidly that it was impossible to type a symbol like the one on the necklace into an Internet search engine. Instead, he looked up Paul Hartshorne's family history, and well-practised hacking revealed the death of his widowed mother – and her home in the mental hospital. He chewed his lip, looking for pictures. He pulled up a head-and-shoulders shot of a grim faced woman with grey shadows under her strangely-lit eyes, and noticed part of a chain, visible on her neck. The pendant was hidden under her uniform blue tunic, but Sam was convinced.

He almost reached for his cell-phone, but it occurred to him that the necklace was not necessarily haunted by the mad spirit of Hartshorne's crazy mother; she could have been another victim of its influence. He swore under his breath. How far back did the chain go?

So, the next question: where had Mrs Hartshorne got the necklace? Everyone who should know was dead. Unless… it was a long shot, but if anyone would know – Lucy Henshall might. He snatched the phone, and dialled Dean.

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Lucy yelped, and shook Dean hard by the shoulders; she really, _really_ couldn't deal with this on her own. She was beginning to think the cliff would have been an easier option.

'Dean! Please, come on… help me out here…'

She rolled him over awkwardly, and her head spun when her eyes fell on his wound. She grabbed her head with both hands to steady it, and forced down the bile rising in her throat. Taking up the stained gauze held loosely in Dean's hand, she steeled herself and set to scrubbing at the wound. It was hard: the blood was stuck was stuck fast to his skin, and she was afraid of pulling at the wound. Her hand was shaking. She found a bottle of water under the seat, and used it to wash the area around the tear.

When the cut was more or less clean, she sat back, chewing her bottom lip. She studied Dean's impassive face; his eyelashes stuck to his cheeks, blissfully unaware of her predicament. She knew what had to be done next, but she couldn't bring herself to do it; she eyed the needle and thread wound up carefully in the open first aid box. Her hands were shaking violently. Swallowing hard, she reached out for the needle but snatched her hand back before she had it.

She exhaled shakily between her teeth, shaking her head nervously. 'No… no, I can't. I'll only make it worse…' She shook out the pockets of his jacket, muttering to herself, trying ever harder not to faint. 'Where's your friggin' phone…?' She found it. Even the three digit number was hard to get right with her trembling fingers.

Dean stirred, saw her with his phone and batted it frantically out of her hands. It clattered down onto the floor.

'What…?' he gasped. He couldn't finish the sentence: the words caught in his throat and he choked.

'I'm calling an ambulance.' He tried to object. 'Look at yourself! I don't care if you hate hospitals… I just… I can't take responsibility, I can't do it…'

'Please…' he managed. 'I have to stop that necklace and…' He coughed painfully. 'And… I can't do that… if I'm in… hospital…'

She opened her mouth to object and closed it again, her hands fluttering uncertainly. She snatched up the needle clumsily, and manoeuvred herself around the steering column until she knelt on the floor of the car, with him stretched out across the seats in front of her. She made a strange sound; half gasp, half whimper, and looked around wildly, anywhere but at his stomach.

Dean met her eyes with great effort. 'You'll be ok…' he promised. She gave him an uncertain look.

His cell phone rang, insistently, from it's position in the footwell. She picked it up.

'Who…?'

'Sam.'

'Give it to me,' he said, reaching out a hand.

She nodded, and gave it to him, turning back to the task at hand. How hard could it be? She knew how to sew…

'Yeah?' Dean managed, in a relatively normal voice. He watched Lucy struggling with the tangled thread out of the corner of his eye.

'Dean, Paul Hartshorne's mother was crazy, and she's dead.'

'I know,' Dean replied.

'You do?'

'Lucy…' he explained. He tried to keep words to a minimum.

'Well, I found a picture, and she definitely had the necklace. Either she's haunting it, or she went crazy _because _of it. Basically, we need to find out where she got it from.'

It took Lucy six attempts to thread the needle, and she had to use her free hand to steady the one holding it as she began to sew.

'I thought Lucy Henshall might know… I mean, that family's all dead, so she's our best shot. Can you bring her back here? We've got to work this out, Dean, Michael could be doing anything by now…'

'Yeah… ok – ,' he grunted as the needle penetrated his inflamed skin.

'Dean?'

'We're coming,' he grated out, and hung up, before Sam could hear anything else.

He exchanged looks with Lucy.

'Sorry,' she said, wincing in sympathy.

'S'ok… you're doing… great…'

'What are we going to do next?' she asked hesitantly. Her voice was high pitched and quiet, her eyes fixed on her work.

'Gotta work out what the necklace does…disable it, or destroy it…' Dean had no idea how that might be achieved. He just hoped Sam had found something more useful than Paul Hartshorne's family history. And he hoped – he _really _hoped – that Lucy's stitching would hold, at least for long enough to sort this mess out.

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Michael prowled the streets, barely seeing those who passed him, they were just shadows in his peripheral vision. The necklace gave his mind a beautiful clarity and purpose. The Winchesters would die; it was the only thought in his head, without distraction, without alternative. He just had to formulate the perfect, flawless plan – and that would be easy, his whole being was dedicated to it.

He felt the wet knife drip Dean's blood onto his trousers and smiled. With luck, his task was already half-done.

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_Sorry for the slow update. You have heather03nmg to thank for the fact that I finally got my act together! _


	7. Trashed the theory

**The Devil You Know**

**Chapter Seven**

Sam glanced up when he heard the door handle rattle, and a young woman walked uncertainly into the room, with Dean hard on her heels. She was pale and mousy-haired, with full curves and bright features; blue eyes, pink cheeks, red lips, attractive in a very young, touchingly innocent sort of way. Except – there was something behind her eyes which belied that innocence, something manic: she was a soul clinging to sanity by a thread.

Dean was paler than he'd looked less than an hour before, Sam thought, and he didn't seem to be standing straight; he was hunched slightly sideways. His voice was a little rough, too: something was off. It wasn't enough to comment on, not yet, just a nagging doubt playing at the edges of Sam's consciousness.

'Lucy… Sam…' Dean introduced them half-heartedly, dropping wearily into a chair. Sam gave him a reproachful look, but he ignored it: if he was _ever _in the mood for etiquette, he certainly wasn't at the moment.

'Nice to meet you,' Sam said, standing up, as though he wanted to demonstrate to Lucy that impoliteness was not a family trait. She nodded at him, and smiled, a little absently, casting nervous eyes at Dean. He guessed she was just shy.

'Find anything useful, Sammy?' Dean asked.

'Ah…' Sam turned back to the computer, reminded of the urgent business at hand. 'Maybe. Lucy, do you have any idea how Paul's mother got hold of that necklace in the first place?' he asked, showing her Rhiannon's drawing of the symbol.

Lucy barely glanced at the drawing; she didn't need to. That symbol was etched into the insides of her eyelids. She started to shake her head. 'I don't know… I only met his mother once; she wasn't really around…' Suddenly she stopped herself. 'No, hang on – he said it was an antique; she bought it from an antique dealer…'

Sam nodded slowly. 'In that case, it might not have been worn for years before she put it on…' He turned back to the laptop, and spun it round to show Lucy and Dean. 'I found a newspaper article. From the 1930s…'

Lucy leaned in to study the picture, and wrinkled her nose in distaste. 'They shouldn't be allowed to print pictures like that in the newspaper. Kids might look at them.'

'Look at her neck,' Sam prompted her, pointing.

'I was trying _not _to look at her neck,' Lucy replied. 'Oh,' she added.

'You think it's the same one?' Sam asked, almost sure, but needing the confirmation of a second opinion.

'Looks like. Hey, I think I'd heard about this…' she added, suddenly animated. 'A local woman killed her abusive husband, then herself…'

Sam frowned at her. 'This was way back, though. Long before you were born.'

She shrugged. 'I know. But this is a small town, and something like that… well, it's like a taint in the town's history. It doesn't go away…'

'So if the necklace was hers… She must be haunting it, somehow… taking control of the people who wear it. But she… targeted her husband. I was thinking – it seems like the necklace-wearers target specific people –maybe… loved ones.'

Dean finally looked up at that. 'Sam, you went for Michael, when you were…'

'I realise that. But I think…' he paused, struggling with the words. 'I think you would have found it easier, if I'd gone for you. But, listen – I don't hold it against you. I'm sorry I said all that, about you getting injured. I don't want you to think I can't cope…' He trailed off, searching Dean's eyes for understanding.

Dean's stomach flipped painfully, but he nodded, face impassive. He could feel Lucy's reproachful eyes on him.

'I killed Paul,' Lucy said quietly. 'I suppose that makes a parallel with that woman in the thirties.'

'But Rhiannon West got me, Sam…' Dean grated out. 'That was random.' He arched an eyebrow; satisfied that he had trashed the theory.

Lucy was thoughtful. 'Rhiannon's an orphan… I don't think she's got anyone, really. She doesn't open up to anyone. Maybe she could identify with you because you're a stranger, as lonely and out of place as she is…'

Dean scowled, but Sam was nodding thoughtfully and he swallowed his scepticism. It sounded like girl-logic to him, but he lacked the energy to combat it. Every breath tugged at the inexpert, uneven stitches in his side, and although the bleeding had stopped, there was too much of him spattered over the clothes rolled up in the Impala's trunk for him to function normally. He felt strangely absent, apathetic; every movement was a great effort. He blinked, and found Sam staring at him.

'Are you ok, Dean? You've been quiet.' He was already half rising from his seat, his hand outstretched to check for fever. Dean recoiled.

'I'm fine. Tired,' he replied shortly. 'Been a long day.' Dark was gathering outside, and they were far from resting yet. Sam wasn't satisfied, though.

Lucy glanced at Dean. She didn't understand why he was doing this; it was clearly taking everything he had to seem fine for Sam's benefit. Still, she felt in his debt: he had saved her from the mental institution, saved her from death, and it wasn't her secret to give out. After she'd finished the stitches; uneven and rough on his skin, he'd changed into another shirt with her help and explained in short, breathless bursts, that they had to go back and help his brother work out how to destroy the necklace, and that, for the sake of this brother's stress levels he _must not_ know that Dean was wounded. She'd objected, but he was stubborn.

If the situation reached breaking point, though, she resolved, Dean's life came above his insane crusade to protect his brother. But, for now…

'Sam,' she asked, loud and bright-voiced, pulling his reluctant attention away from Dean. 'So, if this woman is haunting the necklace, how do we make her stop?' Dean looked his gratitude at her.

Sam turned to look at her. 'That's kind of our area of expertise. We have to find out where she's buried and burn her bones.'

Lucy wrinkled her nose, raising her eyebrows. 'You dig up dead people… on a regular basis?'

Sam paused, then nodded. 'Pretty much.'

'So how do we find out -,' Lucy began, stopping abruptly when Sam raised a hand, staring avidly at something over her shoulder. 'What?'

The cheap TV had been playing quietly in the background sine Sam had started doing his research: he had felt uncomfortable in the ringing silence of the trashed motel room. He'd been ignoring the noise, but a familiar name caught his attention and he froze, reaching out for the remote without taking his eyes off the news report, and raising the volume.

'Poor woman,' Sam muttered, turning back to the others as the report ended. He was surprised to see the undiluted horror in the glances Dean and Lucy were exchanging.

'Rhiannon killed herself,' Lucy whispered, trembling, her eyes locked with Dean's. 'That woman in the thirties... And, Mrs Hartshorne killed herself. And, _I _tried to kill myself…'

'_After_ you'd taken off that necklace,' Dean added.

'What?' Sam asked; hoping some other explanation would present itself, even as the evidence linked itself up in his mind.

Lucy looked between the brothers fearfully. 'Do you think I'll try again? Or-' She looked at Sam, and the words died in her throat.

'She- the spirit… leaves something of herself in the wearers…' Sam breathed, forming the theory as he spoke. 'And they have to repeat her actions. Kill a loved one – and then –.'

'You two have both worn it…' Dean muttered, his eyes flicking from one to the other. No way was Sam killing himself, or anyone else, not on Dean's watch. Trouble was, he didn't feel capable of preventing a _kitten_ from doing just exactly what it wanted in his current condition.

Lucy's earlier words echoed in his head: _'it's like a taint in the town's history. It doesn't go away…' _This bitch had left her taint in Lucy's mind, and Sam's, lying dormant for now, but ready to tear them apart from the inside, just as it had Mrs Hartshorne, and Rhiannon West.

All this - didn't change the situation, though, not really. It just made it more urgent.

'We just got to torch the bitch,' he said, trying to make it sound simple.

'Wait-,' Lucy said, pointing again at the TV screen, which was now announcing a new story to the room.

'…_this young woman may not look dangerous, but she committed murder only days ago, and showed no sign of repentance when the police interviewed her. Do not approach her. If you have any information, call the number at the bottom of your screen. It is believed that she left the hospital in a black Impala, licence plate…'_

Dean swore. Lucy started muttering hysterically, but her words were drowned out effectively by swelling sirens, and Dean swore again, louder.

'Get out the back, Lucy, we'll cover for you, ok?' She nodded mutely, following Sam to a window facing away from the parking lot. 'Don't go far… we'll find you as soon as they've gone, ok? Be careful.' He slammed the window heavily behind her as loud knocks echoed through the room.

The brothers exchanged glances. Dean shrunk back, trying to make himself less visible, but reluctant to attempt getting up. Sam was already opening the door, innocent surprise written clearly across his smooth forehead.

'Can I help you, officers?' It was just polite enough, without sounding like he was ridiculing them. Sam stepped back, allowing the heavily built policeman to glance quickly around the room. He didn't seem particularly interested in a thorough search: bags under his eyes suggested that he was nearing the end of his shift and exhausted – luckily for them – he made no comment on the bullet holes and the shattered bathroom door.

Dean didn't catch the brusque reply. 'I just saw, on the news… it's terrible,' Sam said. He resisted an urge to laugh. Lying was difficult for Sam, but playing innocent didn't seem to be too much of a stretch.

'Really? That car right there… wow. Well, if we see anything… yes, of course. Of course. Thanks for the warning.' When Dean looked up, Sam was already closing the door, and he turned, grinning. Dean smiled, and nodded. _That'll do, Sammy…_

Sam headed for the window, but Dean stopped him. 'Wait till they've gone,' he muttered, as snatches of the cop's conversation with the occupants of the next-door room filtered through the wall.

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Lucy dropped to a crouch and staggered, crablike, away, hunched over to evade the light pooling out through the window. Her heart was hammering so loud and violent in her chest, it should have been easily audible in the motel room. She straightened against a wall, panting, swallowing the humid air in great gulps. It was full dark now, tainted with pools of yellow from windows and street lights. She was in the yard behind the motel, with only waste bins, discarded cardboard boxes and a yowling, mangy stray cat for company.

'Shh…' she told the cat, half afraid its yowling would reveal her presence, half because it would calm her nerves to talk to something. 'You have to be quiet,' she whispered. One more madwoman wouldn't make much difference around here, she thought wryly. A sobering thought followed it: all the other madwomen in town were dead now.

She shuddered. She could almost feel death awaiting her in the shadows, or inside herself; the taint left behind by the necklace, ready to swallow her up. It made her turn cold inside, and she told herself that it was only her imagination. She couldn't convince herself, so she told the cat instead. It stared at her with indifferent green eyes.

She shook herself, and started pacing to shake the thought away. She reached the far side of the yard and spun on her heel, but the world spun too far and blackness took her. The last thing she remembered seeing before unconsciousness claimed her was the bronze symbol, swinging wildly in front of her eyes.

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_Happy writers update faster, and reviews make me happy. Just hinting! _


	8. A dizzying whirl

**The Devil You Know**

**Chapter 8**

Dean's phone rang unexpectedly, and they both jumped. It half-killed him, leaning over to pick it up, but he didn't make a sound, and Sam's back was turned, so he missed the grimace. Dean glanced at his brother, who had his head out the window, hissing to Lucy that she could come back now. He couldn't find her in the dimly lit yard.

'Yeah?' Dean rasped into the phone. It wasn't a number he recognised.

'Dean?'

Lucy's voice; frightened and shaky. 'What the hell happened to you? We thought you were just going to wait outside.'

'I… I…' she began, but any further words were cut off.

'You heard her?' demanded another voice, all too familiar. Dean felt a chill trace a cold path down his spine.

'You still wearing girlie jewellery, Mikey?' he asked. Sam had turned away from the window and was staring at him, wide-eyed and impatient. Dean met his eyes, worried.

'Remember the coffee shop on Main Street, Dean? We're on the roof of it. She'll be splattered across the sidewalk in front of it if you don't hurry.' There was nothing in Michael's voice other than determination; no fear, not even malice. It made Dean's fragile stomach turn over.

Dean opened his mouth to answer, but too late, the line had gone dead. He put the phone down slowly, sighing, then looked up again to meet Sam's eyes. 'Well, Sammy, I'll say it again – your theory's trashed.'

Sam raised an eyebrow, exasperation spreading across his face.

'Why the hell would Michael go for _Lucy_? Don't think they've met before.'

Sam shook his head. 'Dean, if Lucy was the target, he wouldn't have called you… he'd just have killed her.'

'Don't ask me why he wanted to give us a bulletin, Sammy, but we can't exactly leave him to get on with it.'

'He _wants _us to go after her, you idiot! Who do you think the target is? He's doing what I did, using a bystander to get at his real target…'

'I thought you were claiming that they target _loved ones_,' Dean shot back, infecting the last two words with poisonous sarcasm. 'Michael hasn't got much love for us, Sam, sorry to break it to you.'

'Well, he's got to target someone, and he doesn't have much love for anyone. But you saved his life, Dean, and though neither of you like it, there's a connection there.'

Dean scowled at him, muttering angrily under his breath, mostly to disguise the sharp intake of breath as he hauled his weary body to its feet. 'Whatever. We've got to go.'

'We're not going after him half-cocked, you said it yourself,' Sam objected loudly, though there was a note of hopelessness in his voice which said he knew he wasn't going to win this one.

'Yeah? I don't know what I'm talking about, Sammy, you should know that by now. Let's go.'

Sam sighed, and followed. The car keys hit his shoulder, and he caught them reflexively, gaping at Dean's retreating back in surprise.

'You can drive.'

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Dean complained about Sam sticking to the limits all the way to the coffee shop, but offered no explanation as to why he'd given his brother the keys. The coffee shop was closed, now, and the clock visible through the dusty window said it was approaching midnight. They slipped round the back and broke the door on the staff entrance. Prowling the dim corridors, they found stairs, and followed them up, two, three flights. It wasn't a tall building, but it was tall enough, and the sidewalks were hard and unyielding.

The rooftop was stark in the monochrome moonlight, almost entirely flat and clear. Michael sat carelessly slumped near the edge, with Lucy similarly sprawled beside him. Both looked miserable, but there wasn't mush sense of urgency. When the Winchesters exploded out of the stairwell, Michael lurched to his feet, the medallion swinging conspicuously across his chest. He seized Lucy by a handful of her collar and her hair, and staggered nearer the edge, half dragging her with him.

She moved like an automaton, submitting too easily to his grip. A strange look was back in her eyes – the supreme, hopeless indifference Dean had seen at the mental hospital, later at the quarry. That sleeping taint the spirit had left in her was asserting its influence again. She wasn't going to be any help here.

Dean inched closer to Michael, his eyes taking in every detail of the situation. The possibility of a subtle approach had been eliminated by Michael's choice of location – there was no cover here, and no alternative way down – unless they all ended up bypassing the stairs, of course.

Lucy was like a rag doll in Michael's grip. His eyes were fixed on Dean with a mad, hungry light, and he trembled, waiting apprehensively for the brothers to come closer. Dean took a tentative step, and Michael didn't move, so he took another.

Drugged, and floating on the beautiful clarity of the necklace's influence, Michael watched his victim approach. He knew Dean would be armed, knew that he couldn't be careless. But if Dean would come close enough; and if Michael could distract him at the right moment, he'd be vulnerable. Michael knew he'd got him earlier, knew where to strike for maximum effect. The purpose was laid out perfectly in his mind.

The distraction, too, was forming neatly behind Dean's back. A glazed look had come into Sam's eyes, mirroring the one Lucy wore.

Dean stepped closer; he was only a few feet from Michael, now. 'Let her go…' he muttered, without really expecting his words to be heeded, but Michael's hand relaxed abruptly, and she staggered away from him to stand, teetering, way too close to the edge. 'Lucy!' Dean called; desperation and still-present pain lending a rough edge to his voice. She didn't give any flicker of recognition.

Still, at least she was away from Michael. One crisis at a time. Dean reached into the back of his jeans for the revolver – he was close enough now to use it as a club, and all he needed was to take Michael out of the equation. As he moved, Michael let out a strangled yell, flinging out a finger to point at something behind Dean.

'Look at Sam!'

Dean spun round, and his blow missed Michael's head by a foot or more. The image seared before his eyes: Sam, silhouetted against the yellow fog under a streetlamp, toes on the edge, staring straight ahead. Expletives chased each other round his head, but words failed him as a heavy boot burst into his stomach, and stars exploded, red and white, across his vision.

When he could see, hear, feel anything other than pain, tearing him open at the stitches, he was on his knees, gasping. Two, maybe three of Lucy's inexpert stitches had been pulled out of place by Michael's kick. Maybe more – hot, thick blood was bubbling out to soak another shirt. The first thought that came was that he didn't have any more shirts to spare, and hot on its heels, a parallel thought; he didn't have blood to lose, or strength. The gun had slipped from his flaccid fingers, skittering useless across the smooth concrete.

He heard Michael moving behind him, but his eyes were still full of that silhouette in front of him, though he now looked at it through a pale red, blurry veil. He pushed himself up, and the world lurched violently around him. A dark shape rushed past his eyes, and the next second there was a sliver of silver before him, and he knocked it away blindly, wiling his eyes to focus. He grasped Michael's wrist with that surprising strength which springs from need, and forced it back, away, determinedly, one eye still fixed on his brother. Everything was spinning around him in a dizzying whirl of colour. It hurt his eyes to watch it. Desperate, he swung a fist wildly, and this time was lucky. Michael swayed and dropped to his knees. Scrabbling after his gun on hands and knees, Dean turned and knocked the teen unconscious. He moved on past with barely a glance.

'Sam!' he called raggedly. Sam turned. His eyes were cold and full of purpose. Dean staggered a few steps closer, reaching out a shaking arm to pull his brother away from the edge.

'I tried to kill you, Dean,' he said calmly. 'Please understand, I deserve this…'

Dean winced. 'I forgave you last time, didn't I? C'mon, Sam, you know it's that bitch making you do this…'

'You'll be better off-,'

'Don't even say it!' Dean cut him off angrily. 'Look… I need you, Sam. I'm hurt, alright?!' It tore his soul to admit it now, but he could find nothing else to say. 'I'm bleeding out, man, and I can't… I can't finish this alone.'

Recognition flickered in Sam's eyes, and he shuffled back. Dean let out a long breath as Sam took a step away from the edge, then another. Sam shook his head, confusion surfacing in his eyes, the glazed look dissipating.

'Dean? What the…? God…' He took in the blood on Dean's shirt, wide-eyed. Anger filtered into the concern on his face. 'How long have you been hurt for? You… I knew, I knew it! Well, I didn't; I knew something was wrong. Dean, you stupid, stupid freak! Why'd you do that?' he demanded, rage battling with worry in his voice.

Dean gently pushed his hands away and turned wearily.

Michael was sprawled unconscious on the concrete, a bruise darkening slowly on his temple. Lucy was standing uncertainly, staring absently down at the sidewalk. Sam drew in a sharp breath, and hurried over to her, casting anxious looks back at his brother. He settled his hands carefully on her shoulders and steered her away, employing more force when she resisted weakly. The dead look wavered and disappeared from her eyes, and she raised a shaking hand to rub across her face.

'Are you ok?' he asked her, breathlessly, still flicking his eyes over to Dean every few seconds.

'I…' She shook her head, then nodded, and shrugged, wild-eyed, muttering incoherently. 'I don't know. I keep losing myself… something just overwhelmed me, and I couldn't… couldn't… I don't know,' she finished helplessly, searching Sam's eyes for understanding. He nodded. The feeling had scared him, too. He could still feel it, too, suppressed for now, but in him still, like a sleeping serpent waiting to bite.

Dean crawled over to the inert Michael, and cast a disgusted eye over the teen's unconscious form. He fumbled for the medallion with strangely careless fingers, but found it eventually, and yanked it free of its latest victim. Touching it made his skin crawl, but he resisted the urge to pitch it away off the roof. Turning his eyes deliberately away, he thrust it into an inner pocket of his jacket. He wanted to know _exactly _where it was from now on.

'Sam?' he called, trying to inject some strength into his voice. _Miles to go before I sleep…_

Sam turned, and hurried over, concern and anger still warring with each other in his expression.

'We got to secure him until we can destroy the necklace,' Dean muttered.

Sam nodded. 'There's a supply closet at the top of those stairs. I noticed they left the key in the door.'

Dean half smiled, exhausted. 'Perfect.' He lurched to his feet, trying to ignore the nausea, the searing pain and Sam's hands reaching out uncertainly to help. 'M'alright,' he muttered, moving off.

Sam and Lucy exchanged glances, and she hurried after Dean, while Sam took Michael's wrists and dragged him, unceremoniously across the rooftop, bumping his inert body mercilessly on the way.

Dean found a length of rope, while Lucy rearranged the mops and buckets in the back of the closet to clear some space. Sam appeared, trailing Michael's body behind him. Dean passed him the rope wordlessly.

'Good idea,' Sam said, crouching down to bind Michael's wrists.

Dean clung to the doorframe, and carefully manoevered himself out of the closet. He took a breath, then stepped back and slammed the door shut, turning the key in the lock seconds before a thud told him Sam had reacted.

'Dean!'

He leaned back heavily against the door, steeling himself for the next step.

'What are you doing?' Sam demanded. He was definitely angry now.

Lucy's protests were quieter, muffled by the door.

'Can't have you committing suicide all over the place, Sammy,' Dean breathed, the words catching in his throat.

'Dean, you said it yourself! You're hurt, you can't do this on your own!'

'Watch me.'

Sam paused, and tried another tack. 'You're going to leave us locked in a cupboard with someone who keeps trying to kill us?' he asked, pointedly.

'So tie him up. Anyway, he never really tried to kill _you_, just me,' Dean replied, pushing himself away from the door, and limping towards the stairs. 'You tried to kill _him, _though, once,' he added.

Sam's angry objections, and the solid sound of his shoulder thudding against the door, followed Dean down the stairs. He ignored them, and kept walking. He'd had enough of this hunt. It was time to finish it.

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_Hope you've all managed to keep up with this despite alerts being down again. As always, I'd really appreciate any reviews. :D_


	9. Mostly themselves

**The Devil You Know**

**Chapter Nine**

Dean clung to the wall with shaking fingers as he stumbled down the stairs, Sam's yells of protest echoing in his ears. He steeled himself to ignore them. It was the only way: he couldn't deal with another situation like the one on the roof – he was only up to one disaster at a time, if he could even manage that. Sam, Lucy and Michael could all three stay in the closet until the necklace was disabled or destroyed, and then maybe, just maybe, he wouldn't have to scrape any of them off the sidewalk. The necklace itself felt hot in his pocket, burning him through the fabric of his jacket; he was painfully aware of its presence.

Every step jolted his wound violently, but he gritted his teeth and kept up the painstaking rhythm of heavy steps, all the way down to the ground floor. He was relieved to see the end of the stairs, even if it was through blurry eyes. Clutching tense-fingered at his bloody shirt with one hand, he pushed away from the wall and staggered towards the exit, trying to co-ordinate his steps despite the drunken swaying of the corridor.

The first sound he heard, he assumed was just a particularly loud protest from Sam, or a change of pitch in the buzzing which filled his ears. The second time, though, he turned.

A man stood in the doorway, with a shotgun trained on Dean. He was in his thirties, with hair already greying at the temples, and tired lines around his eyes. He wore a hooded sweatshirt over his pyjamas, and stood half-hunched in fright. Dean raised one palm, reluctant to let go of his stomach with the other. The man waited uncertainly, staring at Dean. Sighing, Dean pulled his hand away from the wound and raised it, turned towards the man in the doorway to show he was unarmed. It dripped, slowly: he watched mesmerised as the scarlet droplet picked up the minimal light and fell away, landing on the floor with a quiet, final sort of sound.

'What are you doing in my house?' demanded the man facing him, in a slightly shaky voice.

Dean said nothing, trying to think of a way to explain himself quickly and simply. The world swayed, and he lurched sideways, snatching at the wall and leaning against it heavily.

The man in the doorway frowned; his face lit from the side, and took half a step forwards. 'Are you ok?' he asked, a sense of the surreal plain in his voice. He reached out for a light switch, and the cold, harsh fluorescent tubes on the ceiling flickered on, illuminating Dean's white face and scarlet stomach, the scarlet hand which he still held out in front of him. 'Jesus.'

'I…' Dean shook his head, giving up. 'I can't explain. But something's been going on in this town, man, and I'm trying to stop it. You're just going to have to take my word for it…'

The man's face contracted strangely, struggling between suspicion and compassion. He approached, letting his arm relax so that the shotgun hung awkwardly at his side. 'You better sit down,' he said quietly, steering Dean into the eerily quiet café, and pulling chairs down from the tables. He disappeared, leaving Dean slumped, and returned with a first aid kit, which he thrust into the other man's lap before backing away rapidly, his hand still tight around the gun barrel.

'My name's Andrew Zaretta. I own this coffee shop,' he began curtly, his eyes searching the intruder's face in confusion. 'I live in an apartment above… I heard people moving around over an hour ago, but I ignored it at first, but then I heard more later, and I went down to search the shop. I've had people trying to break open the cash registers at night before. No-one there, so I went back up, and then it sounded like people were talking on the roof. My little daughter's bedroom is above mine, though, and we sometimes leave her tapes playing; it helps her sleep. Couldn't get back to sleep, though, so I went down for a drink and then I heard someone yelling the house down from up in the roof. Just about to head up there and I find you on your way down.' He finished, and lapsed into silence, staring at Dean, waiting for him to speak. When Dean was silent, he spoke up again, sharply. 'Is there anyone else here?'

Dean nodded, wearily. 'I locked them in a closet, by the door to the roof,' he muttered.

Andrew's eyes widened in alarm. 'I'll call the police-,' he said, starting to move.

'Don't,' Dean choked out, desperately.

'Why not?'

'Look… this town has more than its fair share of murder and suicide, right?' Andrew nodded impatiently. 'Well, something makes people act like that, people who would never usually be violent, and it suddenly makes them turn.'

Andrew raised a cynical eyebrow.

'I don't have time to convince you,' Dean told him bluntly. 'I told you, you're just going to have to believe me. The people who broke into your house were… are under the influence of this… thing. If I can get rid of the thing that's causing it, we can let them out… but right now... They're a danger to themselves.'

'And to other people?' Andrew asked urgently, scepticism slowly evaporating from his voice. 'My family…'

'Mostly themselves,' Dean sighed.

Silence gathered.

'Say I believe you… can you stop it?'

Dean ignored the question, because he didn't know the answer. 'Can you tell me anything about the woman who killed herself in this town in the 30's? I think her name was…'

'Marianne Holden? What about her?'

'Where she's buried,' Dean replied flatly. He was too tired, in too much pain to be subtle.

Andrew glared at him. 'Why?'

'I need to know, so I can stop her spirit making people _homicidal_ and _suicidal,_' Dean replied, equally bluntly. His voice was raw and uneven, punctuated with awkward breaths.

The other man's frown deepened; his hostility mounting as he wondered if Dean was mocking him.

'I'm not crazy, and I'm not lying,' Dean grated out fiercely. His breath caught in his parched throat, and he shuddered violently, drawing his arms protectively around his stomach with a whimper. Andrew's expression softened in sympathy.

'You need a hospital, man…'

Dean shook his head determinedly, meeting Andrew's stare with desperate eyes. 'Please, just humour me… for, I don't know, a few hours. Marianne Holden…'

'I don't know where she's buried. Her daughter might – she still lives here. Grace Holden. But I don't know if she'll see you. She's been through a lot recently…'

'What?' Dean asked sharply.

'Her daughter married a man called Hartshorne. They had a son. All three have died in the last year. Her husband was murdered, and it looked like Annie did it. She didn't go to jail, though – she just went off the rails, and she was in a mental hospital for a while. But she killed herself a few months ago. And then… not even a week ago, her son Paul was murdered by his girlfriend.'

'Annie Hartshorne is Marianne Holden's granddaughter?' Dean asked incredulously. Andrew nodded. 'Can't you see the pattern?' he demanded, now trying to convince Andrew despite his resolve not to bother. 'Marianne's spirit made Annie kill her husband, then herself. Then, it made Lucy Henshall kill her boyfriend…'

There was some lingering doubt in Andrew's eyes, but it was fading. He met Dean's eyes sincerely. 'I don't think I can understand… or, accept… whatever it is you're trying to say. But I know something's wrong in this town. You'd have to be blind not to notice. So I'll help. If I can.'

Dean nodded gratefully. 'My brother, Lucy Henshall and a nasty little shit called Michael are locked in your closet. They've all been exposed to Marianne's spirit. Please make sure they don't get out. I'll be back.' He placed his palm flat on the table and pushed himself upwards until he was standing reasonably upright.

'Grace Holden lives at number 64, two streets over. But – you really need a hospital, man. You can't just go out there on your own.'

Dean quirked an eyebrow at him, frowning in mock anger. 'Last person who told me that's locked in a closet.'

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Sam cursed and slumped back against the door, panting and hoarse from shouting. He met Lucy's eyes, and she shrugged. 'Idiot… I don't believe he did that,' Sam muttered distractedly.

Lucy said nothing, settling herself on an upturned bucket and studying the backs of her hands.

Sam was restless; he spun round and slammed the heel of his hand against the door in frustration. Suddenly he rounded on Lucy. 'Did you know he was hurt?' he demanded.

She looked up at him in surprise and fear. 'He made me promise not to tell you,' she admitted, in a tiny voice.

Sam's eyes flared dangerously. 'We have to get out of here.'

'But – he's right. We're a danger to ourselves, until that necklace is destroyed.'

'I don't care!' he shot back at her, with a force that frightened her.

'He's trying to protect you.'

'Yeah? He can't protect _himself, _out there on his own, bleeding all over the place. He won't get to the end of the street.'

'For Christ's sake, Sam! You're both as bad as each other!' Lucy exclaimed, lurching to her feet so fast that she kicked the bucket backwards into Michael's inert head. Sam was taken aback, and, momentarily, silenced. She rushed on. 'You don't care if you walk out that door and it takes you again straight away and you throw yourself off that roof. _He_ doesn't care if he leaves his life's blood in a trail behind him all the way to the grave, as long as you're safe. Do you _really_ think you'd be helping him by getting yourself killed?'

'Dean thinks he can help _me _by getting _him_self killed,' Sam countered petulantly.

'Exactly! You're both suffering from severe man-logic,' she retorted. She started to blurt out something else, but stopped, biting her lip, and sighed. 'You'll kill each other, at this rate,' she added, quietly.

Sam slumped against the door, his anger chastened. 'It looked bad, though. We can't just let him walk off like that.'

Lucy raised an eyebrow at him. 'Good luck with that door, then,' she said wryly.

Sam glanced at it. His shoulder was aching already: it was a very solid door. He couldn't just stop trying, though. He stepped back, as far as the limited space would allow, and raised his foot.

'Hang on!' Lucy yelled. He stopped, turned. Michael was stirring, and Lucy was half bent over him, but unwilling to touch him.

Sam grabbed the teenager roughly by his skinny, black-clad shoulders, and propped him against the wall.

Michael frowned, looking around him dazedly, grunting as he tried to raise a hand to his aching head and realised they were tied. He looked at Sam, then at Lucy, and back at Sam. 'What… happened to that necklace?' he asked.

Sam glared at him, and turned back to studying the door. Somehow, it felt better to blame Michael for _everything_. Although, blaming Dean had been quite satisfying, too.

Lucy looked at Michael. For all she knew, he'd been a fine, upstanding citizen before he put the necklace on. He _had _knocked her out, and tried to push her off a building. The sight of him made her skin crawl uncomfortably, but she felt sorry for him. After all, she knew what it felt like to wake up not knowing what you'd done.

'It's all right,' she told him, uncertainly, not meeting his eyes. 'You didn't kill anybody.'

Michael looked at her, confused. Sam made a tiny, involuntary sound of anger, and balled his fists at his sides, without turning round. Lucy swallowed, and glanced back at Michael.

'Not… as far as we know, anyway,' she amended, in a bare whisper.

Michael said nothing, but wriggled his arms, testing Sam's knots, glaring fixedly into the opposite wall.

A strained silence filled the closet. Lucy felt stifled. She wanted to break the silence, but she doubted that Sam would appreciate it if she burst into song.

Footsteps sounded on the stairs, and halted, shuffling hesitantly, on the landing outside. All three were holding their breath. The steps were too strong and confident to be Dean, returned for help.

'Is there someone in there?' demanded a suspicious voice.

Sam frowned. 'Mr Zaretta?' he asked, uncertainly. Lucy looked a question at him. '_The guy who runs the coffee shop?' _she mouthed to him, and he nodded.

'Yes…'

'I came into your shop yesterday, looking for a necklace,' Sam reminded him.

'Oh yeah. Did you find it?'

'You could say that.'

Andrew shook himself, trying to shake off the surreal feeling which was creeping up on him again. He _hoped_ this was just a bizarre dream. 'What the hell are you doing in my closet?'

Sam sighed. 'Long story. Can you let me out?'

'Sorry man. I got instructions.'

'You saw Dean?'

Andrew shrugged. 'Guess so.'

'Please, Mr Zaretta. He needs help. This is ridiculous. What did he tell you?'

'Whole lot of nonsense.'

'I can explain, if you let me out,' Sam tried again. Lucy was glaring at him. He wondered how Dean managed to get everyone on his side, even when his actions made no sense at all.

'Sorry, man,' Andrew repeated. 'You can tell me from in there. I got all night.'

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The streets were deserted in the grey light before dawn. Dean kept close to the wall, for support, more than to hide. All those infected with Marianne Holden's special brand of homicidal madness were either dead or locked securely in Andrew Zaretta's closet. He was almost proud of that achievement. He'd eliminated every enemy except for the spirit itself. And the wound in his stomach, of course. At the moment, that seemed his most dangerous foe.

Continued pressure from his hands had slowed the bleeding to a trickle, but he lacked the strength to stop it. He'd zipped the jacket to hide the majority of the blood, but there were specks of it on his lips, and the top of his jeans. One hand was stained with scarlet, turning brown as it dried. The fingers of his other hand dragged along the wall, as thug its solidity would keep him grounded.

He was floating, now, his mind wiped of any thought other than the urgent need to destroy the spirit, and remove its taint from his brother and Lucy. Other than that, he was numb. He knew he didn't have long. But he was determined – stubborn – and he _could_ force himself to stay conscious, just – long enough.

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_Until next time ; )_


	10. Need your help

**The Devil You Know **

**Chapter 10**

Dean felt his way along the wall, and his eyes focused suddenly, enough to read the house number. Sixty seven – he'd walked past the right house. Clumsily, he turned, and staggered back, eventually finding himself in front of door number sixty four, the home of Grace Holden. He leaned heavily against the doorframe, and hammered ineptly at the door. It barely occurred to him that it was an antisocial hour of the morning, or that Mrs Holden must by now be in her seventies and would probably be terrified to find a bleeding and desperate man on her doorstep before dawn. He was too numb to focus on anything other than his mission.

The door rattled, and shifted inwards a few inches, secured by a chain. A pale eye appeared in the gap, narrowed and frightened, set in a thin, wrinkled face. 'Can I help you?' she demanded, trying to disguise fear with sharpness.

Dean stood upright with great effort, and tried to school his face to an expression which she wouldn't find threatening. It wasn't easy. He knew he looked like a corpse. 'I hope so,' he answered her, in a low, strained, but reasonably steady voice.

'What do you want?' she asked, in the same tone, without moving.

'I need to know about your mother,' he told her flatly.

'Why?'

'Because I think her spirit is causing the recent murders and suicides,' he replied. He was too tired to lie. He stared frankly into the single eye he could see, hoping that he could communicate his honesty without speaking any more, because, damn, breathing hurt.

He wasn't surprised when the door slammed, but his heart sank.

He was surprised when the door opened, wide, revealing a dark hallway. Grace Holden stood, short and frail, holding the door back. 'I think you'd better come in,' she said quietly, looking him up and down with a startling strength in her eyes.

He swallowed, and shuffled in, gasping when an awkward movement jostled the wound. Screwing up his eyes against the fire in his stomach, he pressed a palm against her floral wallpaper, waiting for it to pass.

'What the hell happened to you?' she murmured, placing a thin hand on his forearm and guiding him gently to a chair. It wasn't really a question; just an expression of shock, anger, and sadness. He sank down gratefully, hoping that he'd be able to get up again when the time came.

Dean swallowed, and forced himself to sit up and meet her eyes. 'You… you believe me? About your mother's spirit?'

'Son, my mother killed my father, and then she killed herself. My daughter, in this last year, seems to have acted out her grandma's story. And then poor little Lucy killed my grandson. For all I know she's taken herself out now, too. Nobody knows where she's gone to. But I'll tell you this: my Annie and Lucy… they weren't killers, not a chance. There've been more murders and suicides in this town than's normal, and maybe yours is the only explanation that makes any sense.' She stared at him, hard eyed, almost challenging him to contradict her.

He nodded. 'You're right,' he told her.

She nodded, frowned, and stood. 'Wait there, I'll be back.' He started to object, but she stopped him with a raised finger. 'Whatever you got to do so urgent, you can't do bleeding to death,' she told him sharply.

'Got to…' Dean replied.

'I'll do what I can do quick. In any case, I'll never get those stains off my chair.' She turned, and tottered off, followed by Dean's muttered apology.

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Lucy could see Sam's anger mounting as he kept up his conversation with the door.

'Are you trying to tell me,' he began, through gritted teeth, 'that my brother walked down those stairs covered in blood, and instead of calling an ambulance, you let him walk off on his own?' His hands, balled into fists, were pressed against the wood as though he wished he could push them through the door and leave a mark on Andrew Zaretta.

'I'm sorry… he just… seemed so desperate. He had to be somewhere in a hurry, I'm telling you. I was trying to help.'

'If you'll open the damn door, I might get to him before he bleeds to death in an alley somewhere,' Sam spat, every word charged with frustration.

'He told me you were dangerous,' Andrew objected; a note of apology in his voice. 'I'm really sorry, I just can't… My wife and daughter are still asleep. I got to look out for my family.'

'I won't hurt your family!' Sam yelled, too angry to make his voice unthreatening.

Lucy let her head drop back and thud against the back wall of the closet. The debate was circular, and they'd been arguing round it for nearly twenty minutes. Michael was staring vacantly into the wall, his eyes empty. She was bored and uncomfortable, haunted with the image of Dean as she had last seen him: hunched and pale and trembling and bloody. Too many had died already…

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Dean grunted as Grace's veined hands yanked the ends of the bandage tight around his stomach and tied them. She'd hissed and shuddered with horror at the sight of the wound. It was ugly: jagged and inflamed, painted with congealing blood and criss-crossed with botched stitches. The three pulled stitches had torn his skin as they came loose.

'Lucy's safe,' he gasped out, glad that he could offer her some comfort.

Grace met his eyes, and nodded with gratitude. 'Do you know how to stop this… madness, taking control of people?'

'I'm sure it's your mother's spirit…' he choked, pausing for breath. 'I… need to… burn her bones.'

She looked at him, a strange mixture of emotions playing on her face; among them, horror.

'Sorry… it's the only way I know… to… stop her.'

'She's dead these seventy years,' Grace replied, her face impassive again. 'Won't hurt her.'

She finished securing the bandage and sat back. There was silence for a moment as she frowned critically at him: pale and shaking. He wasn't bleeding any more, but he'd lost too much already: Grace had been a nurse for several years in her youth, and knew 'serious' when she saw it. She couldn't quite understand how he was still conscious.

Sighing, she directed him to the plot holding whatever remained of her mother. Dean was leaning back, eyes half closed, hissing air in and out slowly through his teeth. She watched his tense face carefully, not sure if he was listening.

Apparently he heard: when she'd finished, he nodded mutely, steeled himself, and lurched to his feet awkwardly, nearly overbalancing and snatching clumsily at a stand lamp for support. Grace watched him try to master the pain and dizziness; studied his tensed jaw, dipping eyelids and the stretched tendons in his neck.

'Honey…' she began uncertainly, her grandmother's heart swelling with compassion. 'You're not going digging graves like that. Could you even lift a shovel right now?'

Dean opened his eyes and fixed her in a brief, diluted green stare. He nearly nodded, but stopped himself. He shrugged. He remembered Sam, locked in the closet, and it occurred to him that if he could torch Marianne's bones, he might not have enough left in him to go back and release his captive brother.

'Listen…' he began. His voice was rawer than it had been just minutes earlier. _Jesus,_ breathing hurt. Surely he should be numb by now? 'Give me… an hour. Then -,' he paused to choke, spitting blood onto the back of his hand. 'Go to Zaretta's place, the… coffee shop… Ask him to let… to let my brother… out of his closet…'

'Boy, what is your brother doing in Zaretta's closet?' Grace demanded, her heart leaping at the news that her visitor wasn't operating alone.

Dean answered with a wet cough, shrugging at her, or at least shifting his shoulders against the wall supporting him.

'Couldn't he help you?'

'_No-,'_ he replied, more sharply than he'd meant to.

Grace frowned, but didn't ask. He probably couldn't have answered her anyway. She nodded, and followed his unsteady steps to the door, closing it behind him. Turning, she noticed a dark lump lying forlorn on the carpet near where Dean had been sitting. She shuffled up to it, her slippers hissing against the linoleum. It was a gun.

She sighed heavily. She was too old for this.

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Andrew Zaretta sat slumped on the floor, leaning against the closet door, trying to work out the best way to explain the situation to his wife, and watching his watch tick towards the hour when her radio alarm would wake her. _Honey, a dying burglar told me to guard the people he locked in our closet…_

He didn't understand what was going on, and he didn't _want_ to understand; he was still hoping to wake up to reality. He was a third generation Italian immigrant, he was thirty-six and he ran a coffee shop with his wife and their four year old girl. Murders, suicides and insanity shouldn't feature in such a life. It seemed to violate the proper course of nature. These things didn't belong in his life…

He ignored the sounds of impatience and discomfort issuing from behind the door. His prisoners had been quiet for the last half hour. Maybe if he ignored them, he'd be able to open the door later and find that they'd disappeared as unexpectedly as they had originally appeared.

Not for the first time, he wondered if madness was contagious: seeping out from under the door to infect him.

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Sam chewed his knuckles, lost in thought, watching Lucy studying the backs of her hands, wearing an absent expression.

A distant sound invaded his reflection and he jerked upright. Lucy lurched to her feet again, stiff and awkward after a long hour's perching on an upturned bucket. Michael, between them, didn't move. Sam knocked insistently on the door.

'I'll go see who it is…' Andrew told the door. 'Maybe your brother's back.'

The door bell rang again, more urgently. 'I'm coming…' the coffee-seller muttered, distractedly.

He stumbled down the first flight of stairs, and met his wife – bleary eyed and clad in a bath robe, dragging slow fingers across her eyes in an effort to wake herself up. 'Andy?' she murmured, confused with sleep.

'I'll explain later,' he called, over his shoulder. He'd never really formed a satisfactory explanation. 'Later' would be interesting. His sleepy wife nodded her assent and disappeared into their four-year-old's pink-painted bedroom.

In the closet, Sam realised he had all his fingers crossed, hoping desperately that Dean had returned. If not unscathed then at least… well, at least not dead.

Lucy stood half-hunched and nervous, tensed similarly in hope…

They waited for a disproportionately long time, the seconds stretching on; trying Sam's pressured patience. He tapped his feet angrily, and finally heard Zaretta's footsteps - and somebody else's - in the stairwell. The other steps were slow, shuffling, awkward, like an injured person's. Sam realised he was holding his breath.

The door opened, and his face broke into a smile like it hadn't in days. Relief cracked open like an egg, spreading warmth inside him. It turned cold quickly, though. There was no sign of Dean.

'Who are you?' he demanded, anger lending a rough edge to his voice. It was unlike him, being rude and intimidating to little old ladies, and it surprised even him, but he didn't take it back. He was too close to the edge.

'Your brother's going to need your help,' she said flatly, pressing Dean's gun into his hand.

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_Escape from the cupboard:D To be continued…_


	11. Never known forgiveness

**The Devil You Know**

**Chapter Eleven**

Sam's legs swallowed up the ground at an alarming pace. His eyes were everywhere. Dean had come to this cemetery; he must be here somewhere. He was walking too fast to read the names on the graves; he was too preoccupied with looking for Dean to be concerned with Marianne Holden's spirit, though he could still feel it lurking inside him.

A dark, organic lump caught his eye, caught it sharply so that he couldn't see anything else, and in seconds he was beside it. Before he could kneel, though, before he could touch it, there was a woman blocking him: in her late thirties, sad-faced, wild-eyed and flickering. Through her, he could see the name on the gravestone: Marianne Holden, 1899-1935.

He stumbled to a graceless halt, slow to co-ordinate his limbs, and stared at her. He gulped. He could see a slice of Dean's face - fluorescent white speckled with vivid red, eyes closed and pressed into the damp earth. He dragged his eyes up and stared down the spirit. A nagging ache arose in his head, but he ignored it, raised the gun still clutched in his hand and fired, without hesitation. Clearly Dean was rubbing off on him, or maybe he was too desperate to ask questions first. The spirit dissipated, and the bullet spat splinters off the headstone. She wouldn't be gone long.

Skidding to his knees, he laid a tentative hand on his brother's cheek and turned it gently towards him. There were flecks of blood on Dean's lips. His eyelids fluttered, then squeezed tightly closed as consciousness and pain attacked him simultaneously. He opened them again with a strangled gasp, and his irises settled on Sam, vague irritation shining through the mist which clung to them.

'Who… let you out?' he muttered, narrowing his eyes and trying weakly to move his limbs.

Sam pushed down his indignation. 'You can't do everything, you idiot. I don't _believe_ you locked me in a cupboard,' he reprimanded his brother. 'I'd love to kick your ass right now, but I don't think you'd notice a few more bruises in your current state.'

'Is she… gone?'

'Aaah…' SAm stared around them doubtfully. 'For the moment.'

'Sam – ,' Dean's voice was choked with urgency. Sam looked round.

'Yeah, alright. Salt 'n' burn, then we'll get you to the hospital…'

Dean grunted, nodded. Breath was too precious to waste in arguing. He struggled onto his elbows and wriggled backwards, off the grave; Sam took him by the shoulders and pulled him back.

Sam stood, sighed, and started digging.

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Sam was hoping maybe she wouldn't turn up again in time; that he'd be able to salt and burn Marianne's corpse before she knew what he was up to. He was just about close enough for that hope to set in, then he'd hit wood with his spade tip, the hollow thud ringing out like music. He exchanged a look with Dean, who was propped against a gravestone, spectating. And then, there she was, standing over him.

Dean's face tensed immediately and he hunched up, trying to roll into a ball and shut the pain out, hedgehog-like. He looked young, wide-eyed and fragile, arching against the new agony in the dewy grass. Flecks of water and blood shone with the early rays, filtering through the trees.

Marianne's semi-transparent foot collided heavily with Dean's broken midsection and he let out a choked cry, rolling abruptly onto his back, both hands clutching his stomach so tight it looked like his scarlet fingers were the only thing holding his guts in him.

Sam watched, frozen. He turned his eyes on the spirit and she glared back unashamedly. He swallowed hard. Staring her down, he slammed the shovel downwards, splintering the aged wood of her coffin. She howled with rage and kicked out at Dean again: he collided violently with a headstone: cracks rang out in the bright silence. For some seconds, Dean was still, eyelids settled stiff against his cold face. Too soon, he choked awake, tried to move; collapsed, a tiny yelp in his throat. A fist squeezed Sam's heart. A voice awoke in his head.

Marianne's figure stood staring at him. She wasn't making a sound, but she didn't need to. She was still there, in his head.

_It's your fault, Sam…all this pain. You let him walk around bleeding for hours. There's not much blood left in him, because it's all on your hands…_

At first he could ignore it, but the voice gained power and weight. He heard the spade clatter against the coffin lid when it fell from his hands, but he didn't remember dropping it. There was cold metal against his chin, and he didn't know why, but it seemed… right, somehow. He deserved it. From his position in the grave, Dean's face was at eye-level, and Sam's guilt was all there on his brother's face. The voice was telling him – and it was right, of course – that pain could be removed, if he removed the cause…

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Lucy stumbled across Michael's outstretched legs, wide-eyed. 'Mrs Holden…' she gasped. Her face was hot; she wanted desperately to hide it, to pull her abundant hair across her face. Sam's footsteps were already thundering away down the stairs, but she barely noticed. She was gripped with nausea: this was unbearable. Paul's grandmother, kind, and gentle, Paul's grandmother who loved him like no other grandmother ever loved her grandson, who had always been kind to Lucy, who had made her feel welcome, baked cakes, every time she'd gone to visit with him. Standing there, staring kind eyes at her only grandson's murderer.

'Mrs Holden, I'm so… I'm so-'

The word 'sorry' caught in her throat. It meant nothing, it solved nothing. It was poor, pale, weak amends for the crime she'd committed. It was nothing. Shameful tears sprung, hot, to her eyes. There was nowhere to hide her face.

She didn't know how it happened, but now there were arms around her, and she was sobbing, sobbing deep, painful gasps from the bottom of her soul, sobbing guilt and loss and love out onto a thin shoulder. The voice in her ear was comforting, shushing, quiet. There was no bottom to the lakes of tears she held behind her eyes. She could drown in them.

She pulled away after a little while, spent with the effort. She felt empty. Somehow, she looked up, and there was no malice in those old, pale eyes. This, she thought, this was sublime – was this woman mortal, imperfect? This woman who had forgiven the murderer of her last family member. This woman who had watched her daughter and her grandson meet their graves. Nobody should have to bury their child – much less their grandchild. But there, _there _was forgiveness, staring her in the face. Lucy shook her head, uncomprehending. A sob shook her; a tear slipped out, a drop in the deluge which painted her cheeks.

'Thank you,' she choked, high-pitched. It was all she could think of to say.

'Are you alright?' Grace asked.

She nodded, tearfully, like a small child who has grazed her knee. She felt about that small. She wanted to crawl back into those arms and cry with an intensity which had left her when she was five years old.

The world came back to her slowly, and she shook herself. It wasn't over yet. Mr Zaretta came into focus, standing awkwardly against his own wall, trying not to stare.

'I have to follow Sam,' she managed, shakily. 'In case he does something stupid.'

Grace studied her face, and nodded, accepting. 'Can you manage?'

Lucy nodded. 'I'll be alright, now.' And she believed it, she realised, as she said it. She felt that she had purged the taint from her heart with her tears. Maybe Marianne Holden had never known forgiveness, from herself or anyone else; maybe that was why she'd been unable to live on with murder on her conscience. Maybe Lucy was the first murderer ever to be unconditionally forgiven.

But Sam – even though he'd proved an ineffective murderer, he wouldn't be forgiving himself for trying to shoot a hole in his brother anytime soon.

Lucy scrubbed a hand across her eyes, sharing a last look with Grace as she started down the stairs. There were complicated emotions in that look, too raw to be confined by words. She nodded, simply. She couldn't articulate it, but she understood.

Grace's heart skipped a beat in concern as she watched Lucy start down the stairs. It felt like the end of something. She wanted to say some last word, before Lucy was too far away. _Goodbye_ seemed too final.

'Good luck!' Grace called.

Lucy heard the words over the thundering of her own hasty footsteps, and they warmed her.

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Dean rolled onto his stomach, one hand crushed against his wound, the other palm down on the grass, fingers digging into the damp earth as his muscles tensed compulsively. Expletives directed at Marianne Holden were following each other round his head, but he had no breath to voice them. He forced his face up off the ground to check on Sam, the scent of grass strong in his nostrils. Grass and blood.

Sam stood poker-straight in the grave, immersed to shoulder height, head tilted back, eyes closed. Cold dark gun barrel resting on his chin. Dean pushed himself up, with reserves of strength he'd thought long spent. Sam's finger was tight on the trigger.

His brother's name left Dean's lips in a strangled yelp. No response. Sam was locked inside his own head, caught in a private nightmare.

Sharpened by urgency, Dean's mind weighed his options in seconds. He'd rather have a brother with scorched feet than a hole in the head. There was a lighter in his pocket. There was salt on the ground, not far out of reach. He lurched up, somehow. Scattered salt unevenly into the grave.

Sam's finger twitched, and Dean swatted at the hand holding the gun. Sam pushed him roughly away, and he rolled back; the jolt as he hit the ground made black stars burst in front of his eyes.

He choked, wrapping both arms round his burning ribs, trying, failing, to soothe his parched lungs. He tried to roll over, to get up again, but his body wouldn't heed him – two inches elevation and he fell back, and couldn't move again. Darkness swam at the edges of his vision, and it took all his concentration to quell it.

A shout rang out in the distance, but he couldn't wake up enough to hear what it said. Then a yelp, a muffled thud, a gunshot.

A gunshot.

He couldn't move – he could only stare at the sky, feeling hope drain from him like sand through splayed fingers.

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_I'm cruel. Sorry. I couldn't help it…_


	12. A necessary evil

**The Devil You Know**

**Chapter Twelve**

A gentle, insistent hand shook his shoulder, and Dean forced open his heavy eyelids, hoping but not believing that it would be Sam. Lucy's face, twisted in concern, swam into view. 'Dean?'

He let his eyes slip closed again. Sam had just shot himself. He tried, failed to convince himself otherwise; that gunshot had rung with terrible certainty.

'Dean, help me. Wake up! What do I do?'

Lucy's voice was distant, like sounds heard from underwater. He was losing his tenuous connection with this world. The hand shook him again, harder, and a jolt of pain sparked across his ribs with startling clarity. He gasped, opening his eyes. Lucy's face was inches from his own.

'What do I do?' she repeated urgently.

Sam had never managed to set light to those bones. He'd salted them, but they remained unburnt…

'Burn… bones…' he whispered. The words left his lips as air; there was no substance to them. Lucy seemed to understand, though: she nodded and disappeared from his view.

Something occurred to him suddenly, and he fished the troublesome medallion slowly, arduously out of his inner pocket, pushing himself up onto an elbow and falling back. Some wordless cry left his lips.

He felt Lucy nearby, helping him sit up, taking the necklace from his hand. She propped him against a tombstone, grunting with exertion as his weight put strain on her small frame, then walked away from him. He noticed absently, that she was only wearing one heavy-heeled boot, and that her sock was getting soaked with dew. He blinked, and shifted his eyes upward. He could see, now: Sam, lying inert beside the grave. Something tensed inside him, beyond endurance. He wished he had the strength to turn his head away – looking at this hurt: physically, powerfully.

Lucy flicked the lighter on, producing a flame on her third or fourth try. She wasn't a smoker, and her inexpert fingers struggled with the unfamiliar catch. It worked, though, eventually.

She took one last glance at the necklace which had caused such incalculable grief. She wasn't certain what Dean wanted her to do with it, but as one of its victims, it seemed poetic justice for her to destroy the thing. She dropped it unceremoniously into the grave, and its burnished bronze glinted up at her, reflecting the dawn rays and the tiny flame from its position back at its original wearer's much-aged throat.

She dropped the flame. The dry dust, doused in lighter fuel, caught quickly, lighting her face strangely from below. She smiled, in relief, or satisfaction, or just in deranged exhaustion. The early yellow sun caught highlights in her hair. She'd never been so glad to see a new day.

Groaning, Sam stirred, raising one tentative hand to the purple bump forming on his temple. Lucy cast a half-guilty glance at him.

'Is it over?' he grunted, sitting up stiffly.

She let out a shaky breath. 'Yes,' she replied. She grinned, and repeated herself, louder. 'Yes, it's over.'

Sam nodded, fingering his bruise. He noticed an ugly bullet-dent in Marianne Holden's headstone. 'What did you hit me with?'

Lucy grinned sheepishly, retrieving her boot off the ground. 'My shoe,' she answered.

'Oh…' Sam muttered absently, crawling over to Dean. He studied his brother's too-pale face. At his touch, Dean's grey eyelids flickered.

Dean looked at him strangely, his expression torn between confusion, suspicion and manic happiness. Too tired to question the fact that Sam was apparently alive, he accepted it readily, relaxing for the first time since he'd seen his brother out of the closet. (Literally, not figuratively, because that would have been scary.) Relaxing, though, at this stage of exhaustion, meant slumping semi-conscious into his brother's arms.

Sam's jaw tensed painfully in denial. This wasn't fair, not _now_ that the spirit was gone. Dean had held it together – somehow – for hours after he'd been injured, but he was going to lose it _now? _

He heard the sirens but it took a few seconds for them to register; he was too preoccupied. Lucy's fingers were plucking at his jacket. Sam looked up, wide-eyed.

'Cops? Why-?'

'Gunshots. And I'm still a fugitive,' she explained shortly, tugging at his arm.

'Help me with him…' Sam muttered, pulling one of Dean's limp arms across his shoulders. Lucy took the other and they lurched upright in awkward unison, Sam half-hunched because of the significant height difference. Their silhouette might have resembled a giant insect, six-legged and lopsided.

Dean gasped, his eyelids flickering. 'Cold…' he muttered, jerking his head sideways. 'Aren't you cold?' he asked, absently. Sam and Lucy exchanged anxious glances, the nearly-risen sun beating humid heat onto their backs. Dean's eyelids dipped. His feet dragged on the grass, slowing progress.

A squeal of brakes made Lucy's heart hammer a heavy rhythm against her ribcage. 'We're not fast enough, Sam…' she whispered, panicky.

Sam swallowed. She was right.

'In here - ,'

'What?'

An empty, fresh-dug grave gaped at her feet. 'No way… that's been dug for somebody's funeral, probably today…'

'Well… they haven't moved in yet…'

'You want to _squat _in a _grave_?' she demanded incredulously.

'Better idea?' Sam shot back, glaring at her past Dean's slumped head. She glared back, but ducked out from under Dean's limp arm and lowered herself down. Sam struggled to let Dean down gently, and he slid the last few feet, landing inert in Lucy's lap. Without a sound. Sam sucked in a tense breath. He wouldn't usually admit it, but he hated it when his brother was quiet.

He slipped into the grave, small granules of damp mud cascading around him. Before he could crouch out of view, the pristine white headstone caught his eye. _Rhiannon West, 1976-2007_. Somehow, it did seem wrong now, sitting in her grave. Like many of the things they did, though, it was a necessary evil. Facing the headstone, Sam stood speechless for a few seconds, seized by some nameless emotion. He crossed himself, bowing his head to the name on the stone. He didn't know any more what significance he'd assign to such a gesture, but still it – made him feel better, in some small way. Perhaps, on a basic level, that was all faith was.

Lucy's frantic murmuring and distant shouts reached his ears, and he ducked down, turning to face the others. Six foot by two and a half; there wasn't much space. Sam sat with his knees hunched in front of him, Lucy cross-legged at the foot of the grave. Dean sprawled across the space between. Lucy stroked his hair absently, making quiet shushing noises as though speaking to a small child or animal. She seemed incredibly collected, considering the situation.

'Lucy,' Sam whispered, a thought suddenly occurring to him. 'Who was that little old lady who let us out the cupboard?'

She blinked sadly. 'Paul's grandmother. Grace Holden.'

'Holden-?'

'Marianne's daughter.'

Sam frowned, then nodded. It made some sort of sense.

Muffled thuds, boots on grass, approached them slowly. The footsteps were uneven, purposeless, as though the walker was looking for something he didn't really expect to find. Sam and Lucy held their breath. Sam found himself wishing he could hush Dean's tortured gasps, then realised what he was thinking and mentally kicked himself, hard.

The rectangle of sky above their heads was broken at one edge by a looming blue-clad shoulder. It was the back of a shoulder. Sam willed the man not to turn round, pulse thumping loudly in his throat.

A distant voice above them said 'They must have gone…' A grunt agreed with it. More footsteps, getting quieter. The shoulder disappeared.

The footsteps stopped. 'Wait a moment,' said the voice. 'What?' said the other, impatiently. Sam licked his lips, trying to make himself small, or even invisible. Invisible would be good. Why couldn't he have a decent super power? There was a long, overstretched pause. Sam didn't breathe, waiting. Lucy's face was turning red, as she, too, held her breath. 'Nah, never mind,' said the first voice. Sam's sigh of relief was drowned out by the exasperated exhalation of the second police officer. The footsteps receded.

Sam slumped back against the earthy wall. _That_ had been close. His breath was raw in his throat. _Jesus, _that had been close.

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Andrew Zaretta still felt like he was floating in a bizarre dream. Something he didn't understand had just passed between Lucy Henshall and her murdered boyfriend's grandmother. He was beyond trying to take control of the situation. His wife, beautiful in her tolerance, could be heard making their daughter's breakfast in the kitchen. She'd want an explanation later, though.

Lucy's heavy, clumsy footsteps receded, and he turned his attention to the last remaining inhabitant of his broom closet. A teenager, sixteen or seventeen years old, thin and dark haired, sat impassively on the floor with his arms tied behind his back. Andrew wondered whether he should untie him or call the police. Nobody had given him any instructions as to this one's fate.

He looked helplessly at Grace Holden, who stood solemnly at his side. She returned his look, shrugged, patted him reassuringly on the shoulder, and set off down the stairs. Andrew stared helplessly after her.

'Um… hello?' he tried, tentatively. Either this captive was a dangerous madman, or the victim of one of the madmen Andrew had met earlier. As he'd already had one murderer, at least, in his cupboard, he was wary of the teenager sitting on the floor.

Michael turned cold eyes towards the coffee seller, nodding vacantly to acknowledge the vague greeting.

Behind those cold eyes, some painful reasoning was in progress. He'd come here to kill the Winchesters, and to flee his probable re-arrest in his home town for previous murders. If he stayed here, they'd work out soon enough that the knife he carried had been used, and Zaretta would know that he'd stabbed Dean. Even if Dean died, there would be no body here for the cops to identify: the Winchesters would be long gone. Which meant, Michael would go down for assault; several years in jail. It wasn't an attractive concept. He was small, skinny and weak. He'd be an easy target in prison.

Alternatively, he could leave town. Probably stay on the run, and out of trouble. But for what? For a purposeless existence, alone in this massive, bleak country? It frightened him: it was a future beset with uncertainty. He'd never been a strong person, not really, despite his difficult childhood. He couldn't face such a tenuous future.

Or… he could tell all. Go down for murder. End it, here and now, in this backward barbaric state where murderers' crimes were turned back upon them. Michael was a coward. He didn't feel guilty: it wasn't the gnawing of conscience which would drive him to suicide. Society had never done anything right by him. He was just – lost; with nowhere else to go; owing his paltry life to his most hated enemy.

The coffee seller's dramatic Italian eyes were flickering over him uncertainly. 'Should I… untie you?' he asked, hesitantly. Andrew kicked himself mentally. Stupid question.

'I wouldn't if I were you,' Michael replied placidly. 'Call the police. I stabbed Dean Winchester. And I killed two people, Louise Brandon and Philip Basing, back in my home town. If you don't believe me, you can call the police from there, two. And I killed… I don't know his name. But that girl's boyfriend. Lucy. Her boyfriend. I killed him, too.'

Andrew blinked, stunned. 'Excuse me?'

'Call them. I'm ready to confess to it. All of it.'

'Lucy Henshall – she's innocent?'

'Guess so. I killed him,' Michael repeated impatiently, in the same flat, blunt voice.

'You… uh… you sure?' Andrew asked, his head spinning. He really couldn't deal with this, not so early in the morning.

Michael's dark eyes bored into him. 'I'm sure,' he repeated, insistently.

Andrew blinked again, then, shaking his head in confusion, pulled out a cell phone and complied. Michael steeled himself. So, this was it, then. He'd never seen any reason to believe in God: there'd been no guiding force in his life. But if there was something other than oblivion to look forward to, if there really was some fairytale final judgement… If all that was true, then maybe, just maybe, he'd just achieved some kind of absolution.

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Dean grunted softly as Sam's uncharacteristically reckless driving hit a bump in the road. Lucy winced in sympathy, feeling the muscles in his neck tense against her leg. The needle shook in her hand, and the disinfectant in her other hand splashed unevenly onto her clothing, the Impala's seats and Dean's scarlet stomach.

'Sam, slow down, I really can't work like this…'

'You want to be arrested?' he asked pointedly, casting another look into his mirror, his face tensing further at the scene on the back seat.

'Not really… I'd rather that than have him die, though,' she replied, absently, concentrating on holding her hand steady.

'Really?' Sam asked, thoughtfully.

'What?'

Sam frowned. 'Well… you only met him, well, yesterday.'

'Is there a point to this, Sam?' she demanded, half-angrily, embarrassed. So, maybe she'd gotten quite attached to the Winchesters in the short time she'd known them.

Sam shook his head, silently grateful. He glanced again into the mirror.

The wound was barely bleeding any more, but Lucy felt that replacing the torn stitches would help it heal. If it could heal. She'd washed it thoroughly, and was confident that, with such a surplus of disinfectant soaking into it, infection was unlikely. The problem was, even high school biology had taught her that blood was like gas: the body couldn't function without it. Healing was like hill starts: it needed a lot of fuel.

'Sam?' she called, uncertainly. 'Do you and your brother have the same blood type?'

Sam glanced over his shoulder, forgetting the road momentarily. Lucy met his eyes. He nodded.

'We ought to by now, even if we didn't at birth. Half the blood he's left around your town is mine, and if I give him blood now, I'd mostly be giving him his own back.'

Lucy nodded, wondering silently, not for the first time, about this dangerous lifestyle which the Winchesters seemed to lead. 'I think that's the only way. Find somewhere we can stop… out of sight.'

Sam nodded, turning back to the road. He cast one more glance in his rear view mirror, once again glad to leave a town and its associated memories behind. On the other hand, he thought, ironically, looking at the tangle of tree braches which formed a shadowy archway over the road: they weren't out of the woods yet.

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_Sorry about the end of last chapter – it was a little harsh, even for me. I hope this one was more satisfactory! _


	13. A strange place for blood

**The Devil You Know**

**Chapter Thirteen**

Far enough out of town, Sam noticed a mud track leading off the road and swung the wheel recklessly between his hands, sending the Impala into a lurching turn. Lucy bit back a reproach, clinging tightly to Dean in the back seat, trying to cushion him from the uneven movement of the car along the rough track. He murmured a vague protest, barely conscious of his situation. Sam stamped on the brakes, and the car halted raggedly. Lucy glared at the back of Sam's head.

Sam was already out of the car, slamming the door behind him, harder than necessary. Lucy frowned, easing herself from under Dean's limp shoulders and slipping out.

'Sam… I don't know about this. We can't do a blood transfusion on the side of the road…'

'We're going to have to,' he replied flatly. That stubborn sound was back in his voice, that sound she'd heard several times that night, which wouldn't take any argument.

Lucy braced herself. It would be easier to let him have his way, but then - she'd never met men as foolhardy as the Winchesters: she was powerfully convinced that they needed her to keep them from charging, guns blazing, into the jaws of death. _Somebody has to be the voice of reason, God knows. _

She blinked, hard, not admitting to herself or to Sam that there were tears in her eyes. '_Look _at him, Sam…' she choked forcefully. He followed her look, into the open car door. Dean's impassive face, tilted back against the seat. Pale as paper; pale as death. She sighed, shakily, and went on, in a smaller voice. 'He needs a hospital…'

'Why are you saying this now?' he demanded testily. 'This was your idea.' His eyes were wide, accusing. She tried to avoid his glare, but it followed her, painfully intense.

'I just…' She pressed the back of her hand against her mouth, looking up at him open eyed through her lashes. She blinked, looked away, scrubbed a shaking hand through her tousled hair, and swung her eyes back to face him. 'You're scaring me.'

He gave her a look which was confused and angry together. Then he sighed, and the sound was raw and strange in his tense throat. 'Look, we need to hurry…'

'I just don't think this is the best way… you're both so ready to… to pour your blood into the other one's arm, so much that you won't - you won't even _notice_ when you start to bleed to death!'

'Lucy, he _needs_ blood,' Sam snapped, rounding on her. He didn't have time for this…

'It's a _fucking_ metaphor!' she snarled back, shocking herself. Sam, too, was nonplussed for a few seconds.

They glared at each other, breathing heavily. Such a conversation seemed out of place in the leaf-dappled sunlight. Sam took a shaky breath, and spoke quietly. 'He'd kill me if I took him to a hospital… and we're not all that popular with the feds, so if I can avoid it, I will. I'm not going to be reckless, alright? But he needs blood, and I can give him that… I can't lose him…' he admitted. He turned apologetic eyes to her.

She nodded, tense-faced. 'I know,' she replied softly, chewing her fingers nervously, avoiding his gaze.

'Help me?' he appealed quietly, tilting her chin to face him with his hand.

She nodded. 'Yes… yes, of course… sorry… I'm just… not, not used to this sort of…'

'Lucy,' he said, attempting a reconciliatory smile, 'nobody's used to this sort of situation.'

She half smiled back, making a noise between a sigh and a weary laugh. 'Not even you?' she asked. 'Sam, what kind of _people_ keep equipment for blood transfusions in their _car?_' she said, rhetorically.

Sam shrugged, his lips twisting. 'Dean keeps everything in his car.'

She nodded wearily. 'Alright… well, let's… let's save a life.'

They unpacked the first aid kit onto the ground, including the plastic tube and hollow needle which Lucy had been surprised to find there. Sam took his brother by the shoulders and pulled him backwards out of the car while Lucy tried to support Dean's limp body. As they lowered him unevenly onto the ground, Dean's breath caught awkwardly in his throat, and his eyelids contracted sharply. Sam gritted his teeth but said nothing: he hated it when his brother seemed so fragile.

A sound between a whimper and a wheeze rumbled in Dean's throat, and he blinked his eyes open; faded green slits between crusted eyelids. Sam and Lucy exchanged looks. They hadn't counted on his waking up just yet.

'Dean?' Sam muttered, hunching over his brother's prone form. 'You with us?'

'Uh…,' Dean tried, coughing harshly, his face tense and screwed up against the pain brought on by his body's instinctive contraction. 'Yeah,' he whispered, letting his eyes slip closed again in exhaustion. His lashes flickered again, eyebrows drawing together in a frown at the spiky green stalks which brushed his face and prickled his back. 'Dude, I think you're taking… the phrase "field hospital"… a little too literally.'

Sam quirked an eyebrow sheepishly. 'Best I could do at short notice…'

Dean snorted; the derisive laugh turning swiftly into a wet cough and a wince.

Sam chewed his lip, suddenly feeling helpless and childlike. 'Um… I'm going to give you some blood, okay?'

A line appeared between Dean's eyebrows. 'Sam…' he breathed, choking as he tried to articulate his objection.

'Shut up, man. You need it, alright? I got more than I can use anyway…'

Lucy gave him a look, but he couldn't read her expression. She held up the needle. 'Who do I connect first?' she asked, softly, as though hoping Dean couldn't hear her. 'You're the expert.'

'I don't think it matters…' Sam replied, uncertainly. Sure, he'd done this before, but… usually with Dean or his dad to instruct him, and they didn't usually give reasons for their instructions. He hoped it didn't matter. 'Connect me first…' he suggested.

Dean tried to lift his head, managing a few inches before it fell back against the dusty ground. He grunted in frustration, unable to see what Lucy was doing. Sam laid a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

Lucy was amazed at the steadiness of her own hands. She pressed the needle carefully against Sam's forearm, hoping that the tracery she could see was veins and not – well, ink - and pushed the needle in. Sam winced, but nodded in satisfaction. It looked about right.

'You do know I'm not a doctor, right? All I have is high school biology, and I wasn't listening for most of that,' Lucy muttered, frowning. 'This could so easily go really, really wrong…'

Sam met her eyes. 'You're doing great,' he told her, 'honestly.'

She sighed, and turned to Dean. He frowned when she took his arm into her lap, twisting his neck again, trying to see what she was doing. The squeezing of the needle was barely perceptible compared to the sickly burning in his stomach and the persistent throbbing of his arm, or the crushing ache of his ribs. He winced anyway, murmuring something unintelligible.

Lucy chewed her lip, connecting the plastic tube onto the two needles. Sam fisted and relaxed his hand rhythmically, pulling blood into his arm to fuel the movement. Lucy watched the crimson liquid's slow progress along the tube, transfixed. It was a beautiful colour, it really was: if you disregarded what it was, what it represented… it was beautiful. Nothing else was quite so living, or quite so red.

Dean shifted weakly when the blood seeped into his arm. It hurt, displacing the minimal blood which was already there like the knife, hours ago, had displaced his blood, all over the friggin' town. It felt like an inoculation: he remembered having BCG vaccination jabbed into his arm aged fourteen, and how angry he'd been when he'd reacted and passed out while Sam had been fine. He wondered if Sam remembered.

'How much does he need?' Lucy asked, tearing her eyes away from the scarlet tube. Sam blinked, looking up at her as though he, too, had been temporarily detached from reality.

'I, uh… don't know. Probably more than I can safely give him. But if I give him enough for him to start healing himself… he should be alright.'

Lucy nodded mutely. 'How will we know...?' she murmured, her forehead creasing.

Sam chewed his lip. 'Maybe he'll look… better.' He could hardly look worse. Even after Lucy had cleaned and re-stitched, re-bandaged the wound in Dean's stomach, it looked ugly, the white gauze stained with traces of red, surrounded by the dark, saturated, torn edges of his clothes. Dean's face, again red-speckled, was so white it was near grey, but somehow young-looking and vulnerable, tilted back against the ground, eyes closed, damp lashes merged into spikes and resting against his white cheeks. Under the skin of his forearm, though, a blush of colour seemed to be forming, spreading extremely slowly up his arm. Lucy pressed two fingers against the soft skin below his jaw bone and looked up at Sam.

'His pulse seems a little stronger… maybe,' she said, doubtfully.

Sam shifted carefully closer, anxious not to jostle the needle in his arm.

'Dean?' he asked again, leaning over his brother. 'Still awake?'

Dean frowned and shifted slightly emitting a muffled grunt from his throat. 'Not sure,' he muttered.

'Feeling any better?'

_No, _said Dean's head, but his lips said 'Hmm,' and curved into a forced smile. If Sam hadn't been hoping so hard for such a response, he should have seen right through it. Dean wished his brother would stop studying his face for any hint that he was improving. It hurt to keep his face smooth. He wondered whether there'd be a good time to remind Sam about his fractured - broken? – ribs. Every breath seemed to aggravate them worse than the previous one. He wasn't sure how much longer he could keep up this breathing; it was draining him of every spark of energy he had left. Sam's eagle stare caught his wince.

'Lucy, can you check for painkillers in the first aid box…? I should have thought of that before.'

Lucy nodded and stood, rattling the plastic box loudly as she sought the drugs, and throwing the small bottle to Sam, who caught it neatly with his free hand. Searching the car, Lucy came up with a half-empty water bottle and brought it over. Moving behind his brother, Sam took hold of Dean's shoulders and lifted them so that Dean could take the pills. At the movement, though, Dean gasped, rolling convulsively out of Sam's grip, both arms cradling his ribs. The needle tore out of his arm, dislodged by the violent movement.

Sam jerked back in surprise, staring at Dean's curled form. Lucy exchanged glances with him, confused. Realisation sunk in, slowly. He remembered the sickening crunch when Marianne had thrown Dean against the headstone. He'd forgotten it, in the light of later events. He cursed himself for his thoughtlessness.

'Shit… he's cracked his ribs. I forgot.'

Lucy grimaced sympathetically; looking on helplessly as Sam's gaze swung desperately back to his brother, guilt and horror shining vividly in his eyes. Sam crawled over to Dean's curled form, leaning over him to study the tight line of his compressed lips and his screwed up eyes.

'Dean?' Sam asked, in a strange, high-pitched whisper.

Dean grunted breathlessly, not opening his eyes. 'Hurts, Sammy,' he grated out. The admission cut to Sam's core: they were words Dean just didn't say, no matter how true they became. He chewed his fingers, face twisted in anguish.

'Sorry… I'm so sorry,' he murmured awkwardly.

Dean's head shook very slightly, his tense expression unchanged. 'Not… your fault…'

Sam nodded his head absently, not really hearing. 'Those painkillers still sounding good?' he asked softly, muted guilt still echoing in his voice.

Dean grunted, and rolled laboriously onto his back, nodding. Sam pulled his brother carefully into his lap and propped him up against his own body, taking the nervously proffered water bottle from Lucy's hands. Dean struggled to swallow, but choked down the painkillers eventually, drooping exhausted against his brother.

Sam repaired the transfusion apparatus before attempting to wrap the injured ribs with Lucy's help. It was a slow task, and a painful one. Sam was plagued throughout with doubts, worries, nagging conscience-voices which speculated unhelpfully about the consequences of Dean not seeing a qualified doctor: _What if he died, Sam, because you couldn't get him the care he needed? _Sam resolutely ignored it, but the thought terrified him.

Over an hour later, Dean had fallen unconscious, but seemed to be looking a little better. Lucy studied Sam, and took in the heavy shadows under his eyes. She reached determinedly for the needle in his arm, but he pulled it away from her.

'What are you doing?'

'You've given him enough, Sam.'

Sam opened his mouth to argue, but shut it again. Resurrecting dead arguments wouldn't help anything. 'He doesn't seem much better,' he objected quietly.

'We've done everything we can. If he _can _survive, he will,' she said slowly, carefully choosing each word before she used it. 'He's strong.'

'I can't-,'

'Lose him? I know. And he can't lose you. So he'll hold on.' She reached out again, and reluctantly, he held still for her to retract the needle with remarkably steady fingers.

Sam ran a hand nervously through his hair, weary and desperate and feeling painfully helpless. He wasn't sure whether he was helping Lucy, now, or she was helping him. He supposed it didn't matter; they could all guide one another through this morning's reparations, as long as all three of them could get through it alive. Not for the first time, a surreal feeling washed over him: this sun-touched grass seemed a strange place for blood. In the scene before him, life and death were uncomfortably juxtaposed, and now he could do nothing about it, only wait.

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_Hmm… that, ladies (and gentleman, if I have any gentlemen readers) was The Angst Chapter.__ There's always one. Usually more than one. ; )_

_Sorry, I was slower than usual. There should be one chapter remaining._


	14. Which had seemed shattered

**The Devil You Know**

**Chapter Fourteen**

They were far enough off the main road that the occasional rumble of passing traffic was just distant noise. The traffic noises punctuated the bubbling birdsong which filtered down with the sunlight through the leafy covering, and the sound of Dean's shaky breathing. Lucy and Sam hadn't spoken since they'd disconnected the transfusion. Dean hadn't moved: he was sleeping. Sam hoped that was a good thing; sleep was supposed to help with healing.

Lucy twisted strands of grass absently between her fingers, staring with glazed eyes at a bare stretch of ground, not seeing it. Her thoughts swirled strangely; she wasn't yet familiar with the person she was going to have to become. She was a fugitive, now: she could never go back to the grey town which had been home all her life. Apart from anything else, it wasn't home any more. Just over the last few days, it had become dangerous and hostile; closed to her and full of madness and murder. The life she'd known; a life of domestic contentment and comfortable platitudes – not an exciting life, but an easy one, it couldn't exist any more. She was changed beyond that: she wouldn't be the same person to her family, to her friends. She wasn't the same, even to herself. That life wasn't enough for her any more, and even if she'd wanted it, she couldn't have it back: she refused to go back to the secure hospital or to prison after everything. It hadn't been her who had killed Paul.

So, her past was dead. But she was suspended, for now, in a surreal present, which didn't seem connected to any obvious future. She'd lived a sheltered life: she wasn't sure how to go on the run. The thought broke her reverie, and her fingers froze in their dance around the severed grass stalk. Her eyes flicked up to Sam.

The younger Winchester's face was frozen in steely determination, fixed on Dean's still face, as though willing him to fight. He didn't seem very aware of his surroundings.

'Sam…?' Lucy murmured, hesitantly. He blinked in surprise, and met her eyes.

'Sorry, I was… thinking.'

She opened her mouth to speak, then stopped, sighed, closed it again. She licked her lips, fixed him in a naked stare, took a deep breath, tried again. 'What am I going to do now?' she asked, finally, a lifetime's condensed weariness echoing in her words.

He frowned. 'What do you mean?'

'I'm wanted for murder… I…' She stopped again, casting a look up at the sunbeams streaming through the leaves, looking for inspiration, hoping her shameful tears would fall where he couldn't see them. 'I don't know anything outside this town, Sam.'

He reached out a hesitant arm, and touched her hand gently in reassurance. 'You'll be fine,' he told her.

She gave him a doubtful look.

'Look… it's a big country. You can disappear. Just over the last few days, you've been arrested and escaped, tried to commit suicide, stitched a wound – twice, hidden from the police in a grave… saved two lives. Whatever you have to do next… it's not going to be harder than that. And you're doing fine so far. You're strong, Lucy. You'll survive.'

'It's easy for you to say…' she muttered. 'My life's been so… safe, bland. I don't know how to deal with this.'

Sam shrugged, remembering similar sentiments when he'd first found himself without Dad and Dean to follow and depend on. He'd been fourteen, in a haunted house with an unconscious father and an injured brother, suddenly obliged to take the lead and save all of them. 'Nobody knows how to deal with it… until they have to. And then they find out if they can or not.'

She chewed her lip. It was a nice sentiment, but she still wasn't sure. 'Well, I don't think I've found out yet.'

'You have… I've known you less than a day. You're not the same person now as you were when I met you,' he replied, with bracing conviction in his voice. She nodded gratefully. There was some comfort in that; enough to put the issue aside for now, as Dean finally started stirring after several hours' silence. Sam's attention was immediately distracted.

'Dean?' he asked urgently, bending close over his brother's limp form.

Dean groaned, tensing his eyelids before cracking them open. 'Hey,' he croaked, lifting his head a few inches off the ground to squint at Sam and Lucy's wide-eyed faces, watching him in trepidation as though he might shatter or spontaneously combust at any moment.

'How you feeling?' Sam asked, hoarsely.

Dean frowned, considering. 'Better, I think,' he answered, finding to his surprise that it was more or less true. He ached, and he was tired – God only knew how long he'd been sleeping, but he couldn't remember feeling more exhausted than this – but, he was breathing, now, without really thinking about it. And his grip on reality seemed a lot firmer now than it had done. That had to count for 'better.'

'You think?'

Dean nodded, letting his head fall back onto the dusty ground. 'How are you?' he rasped, searching Sam's face with his eyes. He looked pale and tired, but more or less healthy.

'Me? I'm fine. Do you even _know_ how much you scared me?' Sam demanded, indignant that his brother was worrying about him, even now.

'Sorry, man… Guess you're still pissed about the closet, huh?'

'Damn right I am… You locked me in a closet with _Michael Andover_, possibly my least favourite person in the _whole world,_' he complained petulantly, quirking an unimpressed eyebrow. 'Payback's gonna be a bitch for that one, Dean.'

Dean smirked sleepily. 'Yeah, I can't wait to see you try…'

'Try? Tough talk from the guy lying on the ground.'

'You'd be surprised.'

Sam snorted. That was a little close to the bone: hell, yeah, he'd been surprised how far Dean had pushed himself while leaking his guts out all over the town. He was furious with him, but the dressing-down would have to wait until his brother looked a little more alive. For now, he settled for mild rebukes. 'Even for _you_ that was stupid, Dean.'

Dean half-smiled, no hint of guilt or regret in his eyes. 'Worked,' he whispered.

Sam grimaced at him. 'Maybe by some messed-up Dean Winchester logic. 'Cause I wouldn't say it _worked_ very well at all… you nearly died. Would have done, if I hadn't got out of that closet.'

Dean said nothing, still smiling. _It worked… you didn't kill yourself. You're not hurt. That's all I was trying to do, and it worked. _

Sam glared at him, but the sour look wouldn't rest long on his face; it was quickly broken by a relieved grin. He realised that he'd been on tenterhooks for hours, every muscle tensed in the hope that his brother would be alright. Letting go of all that fear was such a release, it almost hurt. 'It's good to have you back with us, man.'

Dean smirked, infuriatingly. 'Worried about me?'

Sam opened his mouth to tell him '_Of course, you idiot,'_ but shut it again stubbornly at the smug look on his brother's face. 'No,' he said, failing to sound convincing.

Dean laughed, meeting Lucy's eyes. She shrugged wearily. 'Well… he does a good impression of worried, then,' she conceded. She was exhausted from sitting in tension for so long.

A silence gathered between them as each reflected separately on the disasters they'd somehow averted. The quiet stretched to the point when it became difficult to interrupt, and Dean's voice when he eventually spoke up sounded too loud in the quiet air.

'Sam… it's not that I'm not enjoying communing with nature, or anything, but… a motel would be good about now,' he suggested.

Jerked from a reverie, Sam threw a surprised glance at his brother, blinking. 'Yeah… good plan.' He smirked suddenly. 'Tired after all that sleeping, Dean?'

Dean gave him a wry look, and nodded sincerely. 'Yup. Also kind of sick of wearing blood as a fashion accessory. "Goth" never did it for me.'

'Really?' Sam asked, helping his brother to his feet to struggle the three-foot distance to the Impala. 'Thought anything'd do it for you.'

Lucy wrinkled her nose at them, muttering something derogatory under her breath.

When the Impala finally rolled up to the end of the dirt track, Sam braked harshly, drawing in a panicked breath. An obstacle was parked across the exit, blocking their path onto the main road and freedom. The obstacle had four wheels, and blue lights mounted on the roof. Lucy's eyes widened in horror, and she shrunk back timidly against the leather of the back seat. 'Now what?' she squeaked.

A gangly, uniformed young man folded himself out of the car door and approached. Lucy stared at him, frozen, cursing her luck. She'd come so close to escape. The cop's face brightened at the sight of her. He was familiar: it was a small town, and she'd known him all her life, not well, but well enough to say 'Hi' to when they passed in the street. He could only be a few years older than she was. 'Lucy!' he exclaimed, relief and nervousness filling his voice strangely. She supposed she'd have to expect that kind of tone, now that she was convicted of murder.

Sam shot a glance at her, grimacing. 'Any ideas?' he muttered, looking sideways at his brother.

Dean shook his head, tight-jawed, his eyes fixed on the approaching officer. He was still pale, and slumped awkwardly in the seat. Sam hoped the cop wouldn't realise that the dark stains across Dean's tattered jacket and shirt were blood. They couldn't deal with any more trouble…

Lucy shifted across the seat nervously and pulled the door handle, not taking her eyes off the policeman. She tried to remember his name, but couldn't in the heat of the moment. Sam glanced at her again. 'Lucy…?' he began, but she was already stepping out of the door and towards the cop. She wanted to distract attention from the Winchesters. They'd tried to help her, and if, ultimately, they'd been unable to prevent the inevitable, she didn't want to pull them down along with her.

'Lucy…' panted the cop, clumsily stopping in front of her. 'Glad I found you.'

She frowned. It didn't seem a fitting prologue for the arrest of a murderer. She offered a confused half-smile, waiting for things to become clear.

'You should know: they found him. The guy who killed Paul; he's been arrested, he confessed to everything.'

Lucy was stunned. The words '_What? _I _killed Paul,' _were on her lips in a second, but she swallowed them with a hoarse grunt. She gaped, and eventually found her breath. 'Ah... good. That's good,' she croaked. Apparently, he took her shock for overwhelming relief, and steamrollered on, grinning awkwardly at her.

'I just wanted to say… I'm really sorry that I thought it was you. I should have known better… should never have believed what they were saying about you. I'm sorry.'

'Um… that's… ok,' she managed to say, her mind drifting, dreamlike, detached from this bizarre twist of events. 'So, uh… who was it?'

'Some guy called Michael Andover. He was suspected of some previous murders, too, but I guess he decided to repent. Don't see that God'll take him after all that killin', if he's sorry or not, but… He confessed to it, all of it.'

She wanted to object to that sentiment, to tell him that being sorry was the whole point, that anybody who truly regretted their sins would be forgiven in an ideal world, but she choked the words back down before they could pass her lips. She had strong feelings about forgiveness, now.

'So… uh…' She was a little nervous about the next question, worried that it would remind him of a duty. 'I'm not… wanted for murder, any more?'

'No… I mean, usually, there'd be a lot of legal issues to work out, but… as this guy's given a statement confessing to everything, and because we all know you… we'd rather just let it all go, this time. Soon, it'll just be a bad memory.' He offered her a lopsided smile.

'Well… thanks,' she said, still stunned at her luck, at Michael's incredible selflessness. She'd thought him just another victim of the necklace, but the Winchesters' venom for him had convinced her that he was worse, far worse, even without the haunted jewellery's influence. Such an action seemed incongruous with the image she'd built of the young man who'd sat next to her in Zaretta's closet for hours.

He nodded, looking at her a little nervously; perhaps unable to fully detach her from the murderess he'd thought her until recently, perhaps afraid that she'd be angry with him for believing her capable of murder. After a few more exchanged words, he seemed grateful when she murmured, 'Well, bye, then.' She watched him get in his car and start the engine, so lost in her tangled thoughts that she didn't hear the Winchesters emerge from their car. Sam tapped her on the shoulder, and she spun round, startled. He gaped at her, asking an incredulous question with his eyes. Dean, leaning heavily against the car door, frowned confusedly at her across the polished black roof of the Impala.

'I got away with it,' she murmured, the gravity of the revelation sinking into her as she said it. 'Somehow, I got away with it.'

'How…?' Sam asked.

'That guy – Michael – told them it was him. _Confessed_, that cop kept saying. Michael _confessed,_' the word came out clumsily: it sounded so strange, confessing to somebody else's crime. 'Why would he do that?'

She looked at Dean. He shook his head, uncomprehending.

'But…' Lucy continued. 'How could they believe him? I mean… I was _bragging_ about how I'd killed him-.'

'To Rhiannon. She'd dead.'

'But…' Lucy continued, twisting her mouth uncomfortably at the idea that she'd benefited somehow from Rhiannon's suicide.

'I guess… people are good at forgetting things they don't want to believe. You were one of their own… it's easier to believe it was a stranger.'

_You were one of their own._ Lucy noted Sam's use of the past tense. She realised, belatedly, that she didn't have to leave, now. She could go back to the life which had seemed shattered, with her parents, her secure and routine existence. But a second realisation followed it, a split second later. She couldn't go back. Nobody would look at her the same; getting back into that life would be a struggle. But, that wasn't the reason. She'd been pushed out of her normal life, and been forced to deal with extraordinary circumstances: she wasn't the same person any more. The life broken behind her wasn't enough for the person she'd become.

She frowned, and voiced another concern. 'Michael will be punished for what I did, though… that's not right.'

'Michael did a whole lot of other things,' Sam told her darkly. 'I wouldn't feel too sorry for him.' The two murders in Michael's home town were imprinted vividly on Sam's memory, but they paled in comparison compared with the amount of horror he had caused Sam, and the sheer volume of blood he had cost Dean, on two occasions. Most of all, though, Sam hated Michael because he'd been one of the special children, before the teen's abilities had been leeched from him after a failure to do the demon's bidding. He represented everything that Sam was afraid of becoming: deranged, friendless, sadistic and alone.

'Maybe Michael's reforming,' Dean mused softly. He looked at Sam, not voicing the rest of his sentiment, not needing to. _So there's hope for you, too, Sam._

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_Sorry! Slow update, I know, even for me. I guess I got so caught up in reading the work of other, better authors, that my fic seemed to pale in comparison! Anyway, I hope the chapter was worth waiting for. : ) Short epilogue to come. _


	15. Reflections

**The Devil You Know**

**Epilogue**

At the bus station, Lucy bought the next ticket available with a reckless disregard for the direction it would take her in, her lips set in steely determination. Now that she wasn't a fugitive, the idea of starting a new life was less frightening, but leaving behind everything she knew was never going to be easy, and it frightened her; letting her past die behind her like it had never been. She blinked, reproaching herself fiercely. It was the future that she needed to concentrate on.

Clutching her ticket in sweaty fingers, she stepped out into the muggy sunlight. The Winchesters were waiting, leaning against their car; all their masks back up after the events of a few nights ago. They still looked pale, and Dean was supporting most of his weight against the Impala's hood, but both faces were impassive.

'Are you going to be ok?' Sam asked her, pulling his eyebrows together in a sort of sympathetic frown.

Lucy thought it was an ironic question, considering he'd told her with such great certainty that she _would_ be ok, not so long ago. She nodded, though, her throat too dry for argument.

'Take care of yourselves, okay?' she told them, when she'd found her voice. They nodded indifferently, so she elaborated, determined to make them understand what she was trying to say. 'I mean it. Yourselves – not just each other.'

Dean had the grace to look vaguely sheepish, and Sam nodded thoughtfully, meeting her narrowed eyes.

A reflective silence fell, broken by the rumble and hiss of a coach pulling up and braking in front of the building. 'Guess that's my bus,' Lucy muttered, failing to keep the tremble out of her voice.

'Hey -,' Dean began, catching her damp eyes in an open stare. 'You're going to be fine. You dealt pretty well with everything so far.'

She nodded gratefully. 'I know… it's just not easy.'

She chewed her lip, fixing her eyes on the asphalt briefly, and then pulling herself together with an almost physical effort. 'Okay… I better go. Thanks… thanks for everything.'

'Thanks for your help,' Sam replied softly, sincerely.

'Good luck,' Dean added.

She turned and walked purposefully across the parking lot. She didn't look back at them until the coach was moving, and then she strained her neck, watching them fade through her own hazy reflection in the grimy window pane until they had disappeared entirely and the Impala was just a darker black smudge on the dark road.

The Winchesters were an enigma to her. Despite spending the most intense hours of her life in their company, she still knew little about them. That is – she knew them, at least, to some extent, but she knew nothing _about _them: where they came from, what they did, why they kept equipment for blood transfusions in their distinctive car. One thing was certain: even if – as seemed likely – even if she never saw them again, they would leave a lasting impression.

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As dusk gathered, the thunderstorm tension which had been building in the air over the last humid days was released in a deluge. Sam stood at the window, watching silvery droplets trace shaky pathways down the outside of the glass.

Cross-legged on the bed behind him, Dean, in turn, watched Sam. He knew he hadn't handled this last hunt very well, knew shutting Sam out of the fight had been cruel, but he knew too that, as long as Sam was okay, it would be alright, in the long term. Knew he could live through whatever he had to with his little brother there to ground him.

Knew, too, though, that Sam was still pissed at him.

'Sam?' he said, hesitantly. Sam twitched at the sound of his voice, but didn't turn round. He fixed his eyes resolutely on the blurred rain-streaked parking lot. 'Look, Sam, I'm sorry I locked you in the closet. What else do you want me to say?'

Sam chewed his lip. He appreciated Dean's effort, but his brother was missing the point. 'It's not that,' he croaked, sneaking a glance at Dean's earnest expression on his reflection in the glass.

'Then what?' Dean demanded, frustrated. A pang flashed across his midsection, and he winced, cradling his ribs absently with one hand. Sam caught the action in the window, and winced in sympathy.

'I get why you didn't tell me you were wounded, Dean…' Sam began. It was hard to push the words out, but he'd be a hypocrite if he refused to talk about his feelings, after all the times he'd been angry at Dean for keeping his emotions to himself.

'You do?' Dean asked, genuinely surprised. He couldn't explain to himself why he'd hidden the injury from Sam; he could only remember a state of pain and shock, and clinging desperately to the idea that he had to protect Sam from that pain. It had been irrational, yes, but few people were rational when they had seeping wounds in their stomachs. 'I get that you're pissed at me, Sam…'

'I'm not!' Sam burst out, slamming one palm against the window.

Dean frowned. 'You're… not?' he asked, confused. 'Attacking the window kinda suggests "pissed", Sammy…'

Sam sighed, resting his forehead against the cool glass. 'I just… do you remember me yelling at you for getting hurt all the time? I said that to you, and then you got stabbed… I know why you didn't tell me. I'm sorry I put you in that position, Dean. I was being selfish.'

'Oh, come on, Sammy. Anyone'd think you_ like_ feeling guilty, the way you do this to yourself,' Dean told him harshly, glaring at his brother's back. 'None of what happened was your fault.'

'No… but I dealt with it badly,' Sam muttered.

'There's not really a good way to deal with all that, Sam… but, look we did alright. We're both fine.'

'You nearly weren't.'

'But I'm _fine_. Doesn't matter what nearly happened. It didn't happen,' Dean said flatly, turning wide open eyes on the back of Sam's head. Sam said nothing. 'Okay?' Dean asked, and watched Sam's head bob in a vague nod.

Sam let out a shaky sigh, half turning to meet Dean's eyes. 'Just look after yourself, alright,' he said eventually. 'Got enough stress to last us awhile.'

Dean gave him a mock salute. 'Point taken.'

'And I'm still going to get you back for the closet.'

They exchanged smirks, and the atmosphere relaxed. Sam turned back to the window and looked thoughtfully at the rain. His lips quirked as a sudden thought occurred to him.

'I think they call that pathetic fallacy,' he murmured.

Dean gave him a sideways look. He wasn't going to rise to that. It was clearly one of Sam's 'college' words, but they could usually be worked out from context, denying Sam the satisfaction of explaining them. He waited. After a beat, Sam turned to look at him, grinning. 'Storm's broke.'

Dean frowned. 'Thought we'd agreed that the storm was done with, at least for now.'

'No, I mean… it's like the tension went out of the air,' he explained, his thoughtful expression dissolving when Dean laughed at him.

'Now I'm worried. It scares me when you start waxing poetic.'

Sam groaned, and left the window to flop on the vacant bed, reaching for the TV remote. Dean's eyes remained fixed on the window, and he watched a bright raindrop pick up speed as it wavered down the grimy pain.

'Storm's broke,' he echoed, under his breath.

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_Complete! God, I thought it would never end. ; ) _

_I'm vaguely planning to write the pre-series situation I mentioned last chapter in which Sam has to take charge for the first time. Don't hold your breath, though… you know it sometimes takes me a while to get my act together! _

_Thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed this story, especially those who have sent multiple reviews. I've been crazy busy recently, and this story would never have reached a conclusion without the support and encouragement from those few people. _


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